


The Connection Between Stars

by Veggieheist



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: Angst, Anxiety Attacks, Dreams and Nightmares, Dubious Consent, Dubious Morality, Electric Feels, Eventual Smut, Explicit Language, Explicit Sexual Content, F/M, Fluff, Food Issues, Force Bond (Star Wars), Force Visions, Galactic politics, Gaslighting, Inappropriate Use of the Force, Maybe - Freeform, Post-Star Wars: The Last Jedi, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Renperor, Sexual Assault, Slow Burn, Some Legends references, That tension tho, The Force, The Military Industrial Complex, all aboard the pain train until then, epic game of space tag, galactic tug-of-war, its not the focus of the story but it comes up, slight trigger warning for any eating disorder sufferers or survivors, the Knights of Ren and their
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-12-11
Updated: 2020-01-08
Packaged: 2021-03-07 19:22:27
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 7
Words: 63,230
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21756934
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Veggieheist/pseuds/Veggieheist
Summary: Separated once again by the vastness of the galaxy and the dualities of their convictions, Rey and Kylo still somehow find themselves connected by their Force bond in their most vulnerable times yet. It's the most difficult trial either of them have been through, made only more complicated by the close presence of the Knights of Ren by Kylo's side, and a mysterious and terrifying ghost haunting Rey's life. But as time goes on and a rising power threatens to keep the galaxy in perpetual imbalance, Rey and Kylo must figure out how to navigate their warring sides in order to find a way to survive the coming storm--and maybe find a way to finally be together without destroying themselves in the process.
Relationships: Kylo Ren/Rey, Rey/Ben Solo | Kylo Ren
Comments: 57
Kudos: 95





	1. An Unexpected Visit

**Author's Note:**

> I actually started writing this story two years ago after TLJ came out, and had it posted for a while. The formatting was all messed up though, and I couldn't figure out how to fix it so I decided to delete the old version and repost it with better formatting. Right now I have up to chapter 6 written, and I hope to have chapter 7 done before the end of the year.   
Originally the first two chapters were a pair of one-shots, which is why they have a slightly different feel (and much smaller word count) than the rest of the chapters. I hope you enjoy them nonetheless :)

* * *

Rey awoke slowly in her bed, feeling a familiar sense of otherness drown out the noise of the ship around her. In her grogginess she assumed they'd finally landed and docked, otherwise why couldn't she hear the usual hum of the engines? But then a second later the rest of her brain woke up and she opened her eyes to see one Ben Solo lying asleep not a foot away from her on the bed that seemed much smaller when she'd gone to sleep earlier.

The damn bond again. It picked a hell of a time to connect them.

She stiffened but didn't otherwise move, afraid to wake him. Her eyes flickered to where her still-broken lightsaber and a small blaster sat on a shelf near the door. She called the blaster to her and hid it beneath her blanket. She wasn't taking any chances should Kylo wake and become violent with her. Their last conversation through the force had ended in a heated yelling match, with the man actually _grabbing_ her arm as she turned from him in fury, trying to end their pointless argument about whom would be turning whom to what side of the force. They had already established they could touch each other through the force, so what was it to say they couldn't hurt each other, or even kill?

Yeah, she definitely wasn't taking any chances. Even if she knew Ben Solo would never hurt her, the part of him that was still Kylo Ren was all uncontrolled rage and violence.

Plus she was still recovering from a nasty blaster wound to her neck. She'd gotten distracted in battle when Finn had almost been blown up by a stray bomb, and a trooper had taken advantage of the opening. The field medic managed to apply bacta to it and save her from lethal blood loss, but she was still feeling a little weak and the phantom pain from the memory of the battle tickled at the edge of her senses. All that was left physically was a light scar, but in reality she'd almost died and that weighed heavily on her mind. She needed to be stronger, quicker on her feet. She couldn't let anything distract her. People's lives depended on her.

A deep sigh from the sleeping man drew her attention back. He was lying on his side, his massive form and broad shoulders taking up so much space in the closet-sized room (although, Rey couldn't tell if it was her imagination or did it seem like there was a hazy image of another room beyond him? It was like she was looking at her room through a pane of transparisteel that had a different image faintly reflected on it.). His dark hair framed his head like a black halo, a few wayward wisps across his eyes trembling with every exhale. He wasn't wearing a tunic, _again_, much to her slight embarrassment, and his skin was a soft grey in the hazy light of the tinted viewport at her back.  
_  
You could just kill Kylo right now and end the war._ A voice whispered in her mind. _It would save your friends and the galaxy._

But no, she knew it wouldn't. Someone would step up in his place and then they'd still have a war and she'd have a gaping hole in her soul where her connection to Ben used to be.

Rey dragged her thoughts from that dark place and continued to observe Ben's sleeping form. He looked so peaceful, but she could see the paleness of his skin and the circles beneath his eyes. He was still struggling with himself. Still struggling against the light she knew he had in him.

She sighed sadly. "Oh, Ben…." It was barely a whisper, but the man's eyes flew open at the sound, and suddenly they were each trapped in the other's surprised gaze.  
His lips parted as his eyes swept over her face, at their hands lying so close on the bed between them, her bare arms, and then lingered on the faint scar on her neck.

"Rey." He breathed. He reached out towards her neck and she immediately grabbed his wrist to stop him, shuddering as a humming current passed between their touching skin. The sudden thought that he was trying to strangle her dissipated when he murmured "You were hurt."

She frowned, and he appeared to come to his senses and tugged his hand back. She released him, slightly relieved to not have that humming swirl of connection that always seemed to happen whenever they touched. Her hand tingled and she fisted the blanket near her pillow, pulling it up a little higher. She was wearing a tunic, but she still felt naked lying in bed next to his much less clothed form.

She scoffed. "No thanks to your troopers. Tell me, was it really worth the effort of trying to take that city when your army killed most of the people and burned half the buildings down in their efforts?"

He scowled, but his eyes were still raking over her exposed upper body, going back to the scar on her neck more than once. He was obviously ignoring her, and that annoyed her to no end. He couldn't just keep running away from what he was doing with the First Order— what he was destroying in his efforts to restore order to the galaxy.

"Well?" She probed, not at all finding it ridiculous that she was trying to goad a man into another fight while both of them were underclothed and lying next to each other in bed.

His eyes snapped to hers once again. "You were hurt." He repeated and Rey rolled her eyes but he continued, his voice heavy with some emotion she didn't want to identify. "You almost died. I—" He swallowed, jaw clenching and nose flaring as he breathed. His tone was hard. "I felt your life-force ebbing away. You need to be more careful."

She narrowed her eyes. "Oh, so you actually _don't_ want me dead? You know I wouldn't have to be more careful if you would just put an end to this whole bloody war in the first place."

His eyes blazed. "None of this would be happening if you'd just—" He ground his teeth, squeezed his eyes shut and pressed his palm to his brow as he turned to lay on his back. Rey could feel a small pain behind her eyes and knew somehow he must be having headache. _The bond._ She wondered if there were things he could sense about her and tried not to let her nervousness of their rather vulnerable proximities project. She buried it beneath her annoyance instead.

They laid like that for a moment, silent except for their breathing, the air thick with the frustration that rolled off of the both of them like palpable waves.

He sighed, breaking the quiet with the low timber of his voice. "Just be more careful."

"Why?"

He propped himself up on his elbow, exposing more of his toned chest and abdomen and giving himself some advantage as he loomed over her. "Because when I felt you bleeding out it felt like I was dying too!" He was angry, but there was also something else seeping through in his expression as he looked down at her. His voice was choked with it as he softly implored her. "Please, Rey…"

"Don't." She whispered, curling in on herself slightly as if it could protect from the sound of his voice.

"Don't what?"

She closed her eyes briefly and when she opened them they were lit with indignation. She propped herself up on her own elbow, mirroring him, although he was so much bigger than her that she still had to look up at him. "Don't pretend to give a damn about me when you're the reason I'm in danger in the first place. If you'd just stop giving in to the darkness and accept the light within you—"

"You really don't know when to give up—"

"—that we both know is there, we could _be together_."

His eyes burned holes into her own, flickered to her lips for a fraction of a second and then back up. He leaned forward slightly and it took everything in her not to lean away in turn.

"You're right. We could be together. But you ran away."

She wanted to smack him but kept her grip on the blanket.

"Because you've gone down a path that I cannot follow, Ben!" A shiver ran through her as a wave of deja vu came over her. She shook it off. "Don't you see that the dark side has only ever brought you pain and loneliness?"

He shook his head. "No, the people I thought I could trust and rely on are what have brought me pain and loneliness." The accusation in his eyes made her look down, guilt and sadness twisting painfully in her chest.

She breathed, trying to steady her emotions. "I'm sorry that you feel like I've abandoned you, Ben." She looked up, pushing as much honesty and sincerity into her voice and expression as she could. "But know that I'm still always here, and I still want to help you."

His jaw tensed, eyes hard. "No. You left me. You abandoned me after I chose you over everything. I defied my master, _killed_ my master, for _you_, Rey. So that we could be together. And you ran from me when it came time to sacrifice in turn."

Her voice rose with her anger. "My friends were being attacked! The Resistance was in danger! I couldn't sacrifice their _lives_!"

He shook his head, face stormy as he looked away. "Still holding on to your weaknesses."

"My friends don't make me weak, Ben. My love for the people I care about makes me stronger— stronger than the dark side will ever make you."

He looked like he was going to actually strangle her this time, but instead he just glared daggers at her for a few moments and then suddenly stiffly laid back down, turning his back to her as he pulled the blanket up.

She frowned at the expanse of his back, confused. "What are you doing?"

"What does it look like I'm doing?" He snapped. "I'm tired. I haven't slept well in weeks, and I'm done with this conversation. So either shoot me in the back with that blaster hidden by your side or let me sleep until this vision ends."

She froze, slightly embarrassed that he'd found out about her weapon and incensed that he was just writing her off like that. _The nerve of this guy!_

She opened her mouth to yell at him some more but a glance at the chrono on her wall told her that she should probably try to sleep too. They'd been woken up in the middle of the night by their bond, and she knew she could use the rest too. A wave of exhaustion hit her, and she remembered that she was technically still anemic from the blaster wound. They'd given her a packet of some foul-tasting powder she was to mix with water that would help her body make more blood, but taking it would require her to somehow climb over Ben and she was not going to do that.

She huffed in annoyance and resignation, pulling out the blaster and turning as she laid down so her back was to him. She placed the weapon on the sill of the viewport and closed her eyes.

There was no way she was going to fall asleep with him still there, but if he was going to give her the cold shoulder then she was going to return the favor. The connection would probably end soon, although it had already gone on longer than most of their other ones.

After a few minutes of tense silence where they still remained connected she heard him move and she stiffened.

"Rey?"

"What?" She grumbled. When he didn't reply she looked over her shoulder to see him on his side facing her again.

His eyes were searching her, something resembling concern glinting in the half light.

"The wound on your neck…?"

Her stony expression softened. She rolled to face him, tucking her hands beneath her pillow.

She sighed after a moment of contemplation. "I'm fine. Luckily the medic was close enough by that I didn't completely bleed out." Her voice lowered. "It was a pretty close call though. They patched me up, gave me medicine for the blood loss. I'll be back to full health in a day or two." She shouldn't be admitting her weakened state to him, but he seemed so genuinely concerned for her. Surely he wouldn't take advantage of her, especially since he'd admonished her for getting hurt in the first place.

He looked at her for a moment as if he wasn't sure he could trust her word. Then his hand came up slowly, slow enough to give her time to stop him again if she wanted to. She looked at it but made no move to grab his wrist again. His dark eyes were on her own, sensing her, and when she didn't stop him he let his fingers slowly push the hair obscuring her scar back behind her neck. Her skin burned and tingled with electricity where the pads of his fingers trailed over the healed wound. A heat bloomed throughout her limbs and she was grateful for the semi-darkness because she knew her face was aflame. She'd never been touched with such intimate gentleness before. Such wary reverence.

He took careful notice of her scar, brushing his thumb over it as if he could wipe the mark away. She eyed his own scar, the one she'd given him in that dark place on that dark planet all those months ago. She found herself hesitatingly reaching over and placing two fingers on the end of it where it curled on his chest. His lips parted with a small woosh of breath, stilling his hand at her pulse. His eyes were on her face but she traced her gaze along the scar and followed with her fingers, stopping when she reached his cheek.

She realized as she looked at the damage her saber had done that he had never said anything to her about it. Had never promised to exact the same thing on her, or seem embarrassed or self conscious of it. It was almost like it wasn't there to him. Like it didn't matter. But why? Why had he not been angry with her for marking his face like this? For almost taking his eye? For almost killing him?

"Ben." She whispered, not trusting her voice. "I'm sorry—."

His hand left her neck to wrap around hers and she thought he was going to push it away, but instead he held her hand to his cheek. His eyes fluttered closed and the hum of their connection sent goosebumps down her arm. She could see the same happening across his skin.

"Don't be." He whispered back. His eyes slowly opened, a haunted look making his demeanor almost emaciated. "I deserve far worse."

This wasn't Kylo Ren she was talking to. This was Ben Solo, remembering all the terrible things he'd done in his life. Remembering how he'd killed his own father.

Rey wasn't sure she'd ever be able to forgive him for that, even if he was remorseful. But when she thought back to the torture Snoke had inflicted upon her, and remembered that Ben had been his victim for decades, she had to wonder if he hadn't already paid for his sins ten times over. Maker only knew what tortures he'd been put through as Snoke's apprentice. She imagined any failure was met with some horrible punishment of the mind, and she was at once glad that Master Skywalker had not treated her that way.

But the old Jedi wasn't entirely perfect either. Luke's moment of weakness all those years ago had led them all to this after all.

"Perhaps." She said simply. "Perhaps you do. But…" She bit her lip. "Your life has been full of so much pain and darkness. And _loneliness_. Aren't you tired of it all? Don't…don't you deserve to be happy too?" _With me, on the side of the light?_

"No." He murmured and released her hand, fists clenching on the blanket. She pulled her limb back safely to her chest, closing her fingers around the echoing warmth and electricity from his skin. "I don't believe I will ever feel happy again." He paused, conflicted emotions swirling around him. Rey kept quiet, feeling that there were words yet he wanted to say.

"But if I was," He continued softly, his face open and vulnerable, searching her eyes, "I have a feeling you would be there for it." Rey gave him a soft smile, her heart weeping in the face of a dream that may very well never come to pass if he should stay on his dark path.

"For now I will settle for this." He sighed, eyes closing. "These small moments of peace that only ever happen when I am with you."

Rey snorted, and Ben's eyes flew open, guarded.

"Last time wasn't so peaceful." She mumbled wryly, remembering the panic she'd felt when he'd grabbed her arm and her surroundings had warped. For a moment she'd been terrified he was somehow going to pull her into his side of the connection, but then she'd wrenched herself free and the vision had ended.

"No, it wasn't." He agreed, features turning into something self-deprecating. Rey could feel his scorn directed at himself and felt compelled to make him stop, but didn't know how.

"I didn't mean to hurt your arm." He softly confessed.

"You didn't." Rey lied, and the glint in his eye told her he knew it.

"I felt the ache, Rey."

She scowled, not wanting to seem like she's always the one hurting their connection.

"Well you need to stop hitting things with your fists. I can feel it in my own whenever you go on a rampage."

His jaw tensed as his face clouded. "The change in leadership has not been going smoothly. But they will all submit eventually."

"And what if they don't? What if they find out you're the one who killed Snoke? Don't think that I've at all forgotten that you painted a giant target on my back when you told them it was my doing."

Again Ben glanced away from her glare, a look of thinly masked regret and sadness causing him to look younger than his 30-odd years. How was it a man ten years older than her still seemed like such a lost child?

But still, her words were the truth. He'd been angry at her for getting hurt but he hadn't made it very easy for her to not get hurt by making her out to be the one who'd assassinated the Supreme Leader. Now the entire First Order was out for her head with a ruthlessness that was terrifying.

"I can't tell them the truth." Ben admitted quietly, shamefully. "It would cause chaos in the ranks. A Civil War, even. No doubt General Hux would lead the charge against me, the traitorous snake."

"Technically you're the traitor." She reminded him, and his eyes found hers once more. There was no animosity though, just an acceptance of the truth.

"Yes, I am." He murmured, and Rey remembered that day in the rain on Ach-To when she'd called him a monster and he'd said the same thing. Perhaps his lowly opinion of himself was one of the reasons he couldn't accept the light within. She needed to remind him of that.

"But you saved my life." She added. "So I think it balances out a little bit." She tried to smile reassuringly but he didn't seem to return the sentiment. If anything he grew more serious.

"I would do it again in a heartbeat." He intoned with a blazing conviction that made her whole body warm. His jaw worked, as if chewing on words that were difficult to say.

Finally his resolve hardened and he spoke. "You're the best thing that's ever happened to me." He whispered and her heart clenched at the confession. "I only wish I wasn't the worst thing that happened to you."

"You're not." She whispered back, tears welling in her eyes from some sudden billowing of emotion within her. She reached across and grabbed his fist. He went still as she needled her fingers into the cracks, opening his palm and sliding her digits between his, locking their hands together. The force gusted around them for a moment as the connection hummed anew and their emotions rand wild, then a deep sense of peace and calm settled over them like a warm blanket. Within that the force felt content. Balanced.

In that moment two lonely children found strength and belonging in each other, and for just that moment everything was alright.

There was no First Order, no Resistance, no looming death threats, no past, no future—just the two of them, locked together by their hands and their heavy gazes. It was like that night in the hut on Ach-To multiplied by a thousand. By ten-thousand.

Ben's lips parted, the awe in his dark eyes from looking at their joined hands replaced with a deep longing when he looked up at her lips. Rey flushed at the heated intention, her heart pounding.

"Rey," he said, and it was like a caress. He began moving, as if to prop himself up and lean over her, as if he was going to kiss her, and she knew that she couldn't let him do that, but by Maker did she want to in that moment, but the decision was taken from her when a loud noise echoed from across the connection and Ben jerked his head around as if seeing something, and as she released his hand in a hurry he disappeared.

The hum silenced. The connection receded to the back of her mind where it waited. She felt the emptiness though. Not only in her still-warm hand, but in her heart and soul. She didn't realize how out of sync she felt normally until he was there to help put things back in order.

Tears dripped down the sides of her face as she rolled to her back, gripping the blanket at her sides with white-knuckled fists.  
_  
Oh, Ben, why can't you just accept the light so we can end this torture?_


	2. Even Magnets Repel

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Another Nighttime Force Visit

* * *

The next time the bond caught them unawares, the two force users were once again sleeping. Rey woke up slowly with the feeling of something running down her bare arm, tickling her into semi-consciousness. She was just going to ignore it and go back to sleep but the familiar electricity left in it's wake the second time she felt it had her fully conscious in an instant. She turned her head to see Ben staring at her with wide-eyed attentiveness, his hand frozen a hair's breadth from her skin.

"Ben?" She murmured, sleep making her voice crack. "Wh—How long…?"

His dark eyes looked away briefly. "Not too long. I didn't mean to wake you." His hand made one more pass down her arm (she suppressed a shiver and scowled) and then he retreated, clenched fist pressing to his bare chest.

_Maker, this man never seems to wear clothes anymore,_ She thought grumpily as a blush crept up her cheeks. She averted her eyes, trying to make it look nonchalant even though his sharp gaze didn't miss a thing and his lips quirked into a faint smirk. As she tried to focus on anything other than the wall of muscle and skin a foot from her face she noticed that she didn't recognize any of the room behind Ben. In fact, as she looked around, she realized wasn't in her room at all.

_She wasn't in her room._

Gone were the telltale signs of her 'closet nest' as Poe so graciously described it one day with a raised brow at her odd bits of curio. Her scavenged parts for her partially-reconstructed lightsaber, the box in the corner where she stored bits of food (a lingering habit from her years spent on Jakku), her meager wardrobe hung haphazardly from wherever they could— All gone. The only familiar thing she could see was Ben, but it wasn't all that reassuring to see him.

She definitely remembered falling asleep in her bed, because she'd been tossing and turning in anger for the better part of the night due to the outright snubbing of her abilities by some of the Resistance council members. She may be hardly trained, but that didn't mean she was useless. She had power— _a lot_ of power. How dare they make her feel otherwise?

In spite of her insistence that she had more to offer than they gave her credit for, waking up in what she assumed was Ben's room on his ship made her feel incredibly powerless.

Somehow she'd been pulled to his side of the connection without her realizing it, and she couldn't see a way back. _What if she couldn't get back?_ Her throat tightened. A smaller, yet darker voice whispered, _What if this was Kylo's doing? What if he had somehow transported her to his ship, and was going to make her pay for rejecting his offer?_

Panic clawed it's way around her heart as adrenaline exploded in her system. Ben must have caught the flighty look in her eye or felt her intention to run in their bond because the next thing she knew he was wrapping his arms around her torso and pulling her back flush against his front. The resulting connective hum vibrated the air around them before settling into a semi-calm pulse.

"Shh shh shh, wait." He pleaded, voice tight, his words ruffling the hair at her neck.

Rey stiffened, breath held in her lungs.

"What are you doing?" She whispered nervously.

"Don't go." He urged. "Just, _calm down_. You're not fully here. Look."

Her eyes darted around, but she couldn't see anything familiar. This wasn't her ship. _This wasn't her room_.

Her anxiety rose, and Ben's arms tightened minutely around her, his legs coming up to press against the backs of her thighs.

"Rey, calm down and _focus_." He implored, frustration coloring his voice.

She stopped struggling and tried to do as he said, evening her breaths and settling the panic. There was a distant calmness that brushed from some far-off place in her mind, and she used it as a building block to construct a sense of peace within herself. A sense of balance. She opened her eyes, not fully aware of when she'd closed them, and saw the familiar viewport before her, the blaster still resting on the sill from the last time they'd talked several cycles before.

The wall and viewport were hazy around the edges where it met Ben's space, but they were there.

She let out a shaky breath of relief, her body sagging.

"Do you see it?" He questioned quietly near her ear. A shiver ran down her spine and she nodded.

After a moment Ben's arms loosened, but didn't move. After sucking in a lungful of air Rey took full inventory of their positions and her eyes widened, heart pounding. His left arm had snaked beneath her left armpit, forearm pressed across her chest as his hand gripped her right shoulder. His right arm was draped over her waist, hand tucked between the bed and her ribcage just a few inches shy of her breast.

The tightness of his embrace left her completely flush against him from the top of her spine to the backs of her knees. Thank _Maker_ he was wearing pants, because if he hadn't been she probably would have force blasted them apart without any hesitation at incurring injury to herself or to him.

A heat unlike anything she'd ever felt before—even on Jakku, and that was saying something—lit her body on fire from head to toe, centering and concentrating near her groin.

_What the hell was this?_

It was intense. This sudden feeling of want.

And to make matters worse, she could feel Ben's chaotic emotions pressing against her mind too. Darkness, anxiety, frustration, desperation, relief, longing, hurt, and something buried beneath it all that _burned_.

Every hair on her body, every nerve in her skin was buzzing at every place their bodies were connected, and Rey's brain couldn't seem to keep up. She felt herself start to shake—just small shivers at first but larger quakes soon enough—and unable to stop.

"Are you cold?" He asked, breath on her ear and the rumble of his chest at her back.

"No." She whispered. _Quite the complete opposite_, she thought.

"Then why are you trembling?" She didn't answer, not knowing how to. "Are you afraid of me?" His voice low, a hesitation underlying it. It was silly, really, that he would ask that with such a sad lilt, being Kylo Ren, the physical manifestation of death and destruction for so many years. The better question was 'why _not_ be afraid of Kylo Ren?' but Rey knew this wasn't Kylo holding her. It wasn't Kylo making her tremble. It was Ben.

Or maybe it was both.

She felt a combination of frustration and embarrassment at the fact that she couldn't seem to stop herself from her tremors. She'd never been held like this before, by anyone, much less a shirt-less man with whom she shared a mystical bond, and it seemed her body just didn't know what to do with the sensory overload.

"No, I'm not afraid." She answered after another quake. She could sense that he didn't believe her, and the conflicting feelings that emerged from him from the belief that she was afraid of him made her heart pound ever harder. A part of him was saddened by her fear, but another part relished in it.

"I'm not afraid of you." She repeated with a slightly stronger voice. "I just…" She hesitated, and the lull in her fortitude allowed the shame, embarrassment, and overwhelming engulfment of his life-force (and body) right up against her own to fill her once more. She felt the returning tightness in her lungs, the rising anxiety, and took a couple fortifying breaths to try and settle herself. She tried to swallow past the knot in her throat, to at least keep her voice normal. "I just…" but it didn't work. Her voice broke, betraying her. "…feel _very_ uncomfortable right now Ben. It's _too much_." She gasped for air as she tried to remove his arms from around her middle and slide away, needing to break the connection, to return to her own space in her own bed, but his arms were like a cage around her.

"Please, Ben, please." She gasped, pulling at his arms and trying to arch her back away from his chest. "Please let me go. It's too much, Ben, it's _too much!_"

She felt like she was sinking, sinking into a pit of darkness and heady feelings she didn't want to feel. She knew it was his mind, and she was terrified.

"Ben!"

Finally something gave way within his side of the connection. His mind snapped out of the cloud of desire and longing it had settled in and pushed it away.

"Shh okay, okay." He released her, allowing her to shimmy forward and put distance between their scalding bodies. He kept a hold on her upper arm with his right hand, the other snagging her tunic near her lower back. She jolted when she felt his forehead touch the spot between her shoulder blades. His breath was hot on her spine even through her top. "Just, please, please don't go." He whispered fervently. "Please."

She breathed in deeply, trying to remember her meditation in the hopes it would calm her anxious nerves and stop her shaking.

"I won't." She whispered hoarsely after a moment. Then, remembering she didn't quite have control over when the Force chose to connect and disconnect them, she added, "Well, I'll try. But…"

When she didn't continue he spoke up, the hand on her arm twitching.

"But what?"

She swallowed once more, trying to squash the feelings of shame and anxiety down. Her voice was tiny as she answered, needing him to understand why, and she could feel him tilt his head to hear her.

"I…I've never had so much body contact with someone like this before, Ben. The non-aggressive type, at least." She added wryly. "I've certainly gotten into more than a few scuffles, but no one's ever held me like that. Not ever." He was silent as the full meaning of her words stifled the air, and she hurried to continue before she lost her nerve. "I mean, maybe it shouldn't be such a big deal, but you're not wearing anything again, and the bond just gets so…so _overwhelming_ when we touch so much, and even though I can see my room I'm not _in_ my room, and I just feel like I'd rather be locked in a saber duel with a rathtar than feel like this—"

"Why are you crying?" He asked hoarsely.

Rey turned her head angrily. "I'm not crying you kriffing idiot!"

Ben sat up slightly to meet her gaze with blazing eyes. "Don't lie to me about your feelings, Rey. I probably know them better than you do."

She glared at him for a moment and then turned back, curling in on herself more. "And what am I feeling now, Ben?"

"Well you're certainly not afraid anymore. But why the lingering shame? We aren't doing anything wrong."

"Aren't we?"

He didn't answer, just laid back down silently but made no other move to get closer to her.

"If you really can't stand it," he said morosely after a long pensive moment, beginning to pull his hand away from her arm. In a heartbeat panic twisted in her chest. She felt the wanting to be as far from him as possible conflict with the wanting to bury herself in the bond via his warm body. But ultimately she knew she didn't want to sever this moment no matter how tumultuous it was making her feel. She quickly grabbed his hand with her left one before it could make a full retreat.

"Wait." She murmured briskly. He stilled. She felt the echo of anxious hopefulness in the bond. She carefully laced her fingers with his, placing their joined hands on the side of her ribcage, on top of the blanket. And just so that no other parts of their skin touched by accident, she moved her right arm forward, tucking her hand beneath her head.

She heard his breath become heavy, his fingers flexing at the new current of electric connection. She gently squeezed back.

As they lay there breathing, the bond which had been sloshing their emotions around like waves in a storm finally began to calm. Rey's shaking reduced down to just a few quakes and quivers, and Ben's clawing feelings of desperation abated into wary contentment. Rey breathed steadily, feeling more calm now than before. She could feel something coming from Ben but wasn't sure what it was.

"Do you want to talk about it?" She probed hesitantly.

"Talk about what?"

"The reason you needed me to stay?"

He was silent, but she could feel embarrassment, self-loathing, and old anxiety coming off of him like a pulse.

"It's nothing." He finally mumbled. Then, after she kept silent, he admitted, "Just a dream."

"A nightmare?" She prodded gently.

She heard the click of his throat as he swallowed. "It…felt like a vision, from the Force. It felt so real."

He went quiet, although she could tell he had become tense. She felt around the force for their bond and tried to send him her reassurance and trust. She didn't know how successful she was being, but she thought it couldn't hurt to try.

After a few deep breaths from Ben, she felt him faintly increase the pressure of his forehead against her back again.

"I dreamt of my father." He finally quietly confessed, and Rey felt an anguish from him she'd only ever gotten a glimpse at before. The full enormity of it was heartbreaking.

"Of the moment I ignited my saber through his heart, and the look of…the look on his face…." He swallowed audibly again, and when next he spoke his voice shook. "I've dreamt it before. Watching him fall, feeling…nothing. Realizing his death had changed nothing. _Nothing._" His grip on her fingers had tightened painfully but Rey ignored it, focusing instead on making sure her lingering feelings of hate towards Kylo Ren didn't bleed through their bond. It wouldn't help any. Ben needed her strength and compassion, not her anger.

He took in a strangled breath. "And then my dream changed, and it was you I'd plunged my blade into. It was you who looked at me with sadness and betrayal and pain." She realized then that the look in his eyes when she'd first awoken hadn't been attentiveness, but worry.

_Fear._

"When I woke up, and saw you next to me…" His voice trailed off, unable to articulate the rest. But Rey could feel the memory of what he'd felt—the relief, confusion, longing, anger, and hurt. It all disappeared beneath fresh self-loathing.

"I'm sorry if my disgusting neediness frightened you." He intoned with more than a little bite directed inward.

"It's not disgusting." She argued.

"It's pathetic." He sneered, even as he continued to hold onto her. "I should hate you. I should be pushing you away."

"Then why haven't you?"

He was quiet. They both knew why they couldn't push each other away. The Force just kept bringing them back together.

"I could ask you the same thing." He said instead of replying.

She sighed. "I'll admit that some days I want to hit you over the head with something heavy for being a total dungbeetle, and you've hurt me and my friends in ways no normal person could bare, but…" she paused, heart a heavy staccato in her chest.

"But I still care for you, Ben Solo. More than I ever thought I would, and more than you probably think you deserve. That's why."

She could feel him struggling with an overwhelming array of emotion. His body tense with the strain of keeping still even though she could feel from him the need to draw their bodies close once more.

"Rey…" he finally panted, his restraint breaking like a dam, and Rey knew she needed to act before she ended up trapped in the vice-like grip of his limbs again. In the moment she felt him decide to forgo their space and breach it, she called upon the force with everything she could muster and directed it towards him, willing his body to freeze.

He grunted in complete surprise, arms suddenly stock still mid-movement.

Rey immediately felt sweat bead on her skin as she used every ounce of will she had to keep him still. He was incredibly strong, pushing against her power with all his might, causing it to budge.

"Stop that, or I'll leave." She growled. His attempts at breaking her hold paused.

"Are you going to behave?" She ground out between clenched teeth.

Across the bond there was a flicker of annoyance at being talked down to, and then begrudging affirmation.

"Good."

But before she could release him, there was a loud pounding from her room, emphasized with a "REY! YOU AWAKE?"

In her surprise she meant to just jerk away from Ben, but because of her stranglehold on the force she ended up force-blasting them both apart instead. She slammed into the wall by her bed, managing to duck her head just in time to avoid breaking her nose but suffered a dizzying blow to the right side of her forehead, just below her hairline. Her elbow hit the edge of the viewport right on the funnybone, making her whole arm go numb with painful tickles.

She gasped and shuddered, both at the pain and at the wave of energy that dissipated with Ben's disappearance back to his side. Groaning she slowly turned to lie on her back, heart pounding, and palmed her aching forehead, wiping the haze of sweat there. Her shoulder, hip, and knee ached with a detached echo, and she knew Ben must have been thrown to the floor on his side.

She could also feel that Ben was furious, and she rushed to assuage his growing feelings of betrayal with a heartfelt apology and explanation before the connection closed.

He all but snarled at her in reply and then the bond went silent.

_One step forward, two steps back it seems._

The pounding on the door continued, and she cursed at Finn for being so unyielding. And yet, she was somewhat relieved to be out from Ben's heady force presence. It was incredibly distracting and excitingly terrifying. She didn't know if she wanted less of it or more.

She could still feel the press of him against her back and legs, his arms around her torso. She likely wouldn't be forgetting it for some time.

"REY?"

She groaned again, this time in annoyance, and shakily got up.

"Finn, you had better have a good reason for this…."


	3. The Sound of Silence

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> There's a bad dream, a confession, and a fight.

* * *

It was several standard cycles after the heated force connection (and subsequent unfortunate force-blasting due to Finn's sudden and loud interruption, although he'd been there early to inform her that the kitchen was serving the special fruit tarts she'd fallen in love with for breakfast and if they wanted any they needed to get to the commons _fast_, so she'd forgiven him his part in the whole thing) that Rey felt or saw anything of Ben again. For a day or two beforehand she felt nothing, as usual, but then during random moments—like when she was eating dinner with Finn and the others, or practicing with her staff in the training room—she started getting little brushes of something across the force. At first the small pulses had confused her, until she had recognized them as echoes of Ben's feelings.

This realization led her to two possibilities: either he was projecting himself out to her on purpose, or their connection was getting strong enough that he was projecting on accident. Rey was doubtful of the first theory, having felt how he'd slammed the connection closed the last time and knew he was in no mood to share anything more with her. It was true that before the 'incident' he had been purposefully giving her glimpses into his mind and heart, but this felt different. It was less like he'd invited her into a room where he kept some things out for her to see, and more like she'd found a secret viewport to a room he never opened to anyone.

Translating the emotions she felt from him was like trying to explain music she could only hear two or three notes of at a time, but she was able to get a vague sense of his moods after only a short while as the feelings grew stronger.

At first it was anger, sharp and hot like a lightsaber, then dark and heavy like a wave of black water. This feeling was almost constantly in the background.

Then after a while it was little twinges of self-loathing and despair. She wanted to reach out to him through the force and see if she could comfort him somehow, but decided against trying when another wave of rage spilled over it all.

And then finally after a day of nothing (which Rey found both blissful and disconcerting, having grown used to the feeling of his small presence in the back of her mind) there was a spike of anxiety. The strength of it didn't last long, settling into a background hum as a strange sort of tense warmth bloomed faintly in the center. After a while the anxious hum went away and in it's place she felt something that was like confidence mixed with pride and purpose, and then that was speared very suddenly with something that made her heart squeeze with longing. She didn't know what it was she was pining for until she realized it was his longing she was feeling so strongly as to think it was her own.

She tried to block him out after that, and had been somewhat successful until tonight.

Rey readied for bed, making sure (_just in case_) to wear the long sleeve shirt she'd pilfered from the uniform closet after the intense skin-to-skin contact they'd had last time. Her usual before-bed nervousness had abated a little bit since the force hadn't connected them at night in a while, and she thought _maybe_ it won't do it again so she really shouldn't bother with all these layers anymore since they made her uncomfortable in a confining sort of way.

But in her heart she knew better. Somehow she knew they would connect tonight. It made for a difficult time getting to sleep, this knowing without really knowing why she knew, but once her mind finally slipped into unconsciousness the inevitable force connection was like being pulled into a churning sea by a merciless riptide.

When she opened her eyes, it took her a moment to figure out where she was. She wasn't in her room again, but for some reason she wasn't afraid this time.

She was in some sort of hut, like the one on Ahch-To, but different. She knew she wasn't on that island. This was somewhere else, but she knew it was equally as secret, and equally as sacred. She could feel it in the air, in her bones.

She wasn't able to really observe her murky surroundings for very long when a cry pierced the night, followed by the sound of sabers clashing, and then bricks and wood crumbling and splintering as the ground shook and the air pulsed angrily with the force.

Rey's body was sluggish as she ran from the hut to see what had made such a commotion, finding that she wasn't the only one. Nine or ten others, all dressed in light colored tunics and pants, were gathering around a young dark-haired man wielding a blue lightsaber. A few of the others ignited their own sabers as they ran up. There was something being said, something shouted in anger, in fear. Rey couldn't hear, or at least, she couldn't understand and she couldn't seem to get any closer either.

And then the blue saber was thrust into the middle of one of the shouters, and Rey covered her mouth to keep herself from screaming. The body fell. More lightsabers clashed as a battle broke out, but who against who, she couldn't tell. Rey watched as two more ran into the fray, the sounds of shouts and screams and sabers clashing and sabers plunging into flesh and bone all echoing and building to crescendo around her.

In the end, five bodies lay on the ground, and seven stood around them.

There was a fire, small in the distance, then it grew to encompass a large ornate building. The temple, she knew. Luke's Jedi temple.

And then Rey turned to look at the young man, emerging from the blazing darkness dirty and bloodied and sweaty. He was coming towards her, face thunderous and full of blinding hate and rage. She couldn't move. She was rooted to the spot in front of her doorway, and even though she knew there was a lightsaber somewhere behind her she couldn't gather the will to call it to her.

He stopped a few paces before her, and she realized it was a young Ben Solo, not much older than she.

"_Will you join with us, or with them?_" He asked, voice somehow different than she remembered but still so full of hoarse pain and so much bitter darkness.

She shook her head, unable to open her mouth, unable to make a sound or plead with him _not to go this way, Ben please, don't do this._

His dark eyes blazed blue fire as his lightsaber came up, "_Traitor_" a biting word from his lips, and then he roared with an animalistic rage and lunged at her, burying the saber up to the hilt in her chest, and it was at that moment that she was able to open her mouth and scream, and suddenly his eyes lost their fire as he looked at her in horror but by then it was too late and—

—She woke up, the scream still bursting from her lips as the searing pain in her chest had her grappling in the dark for a wound that wasn't there.

She heard someone shout "_REY_!" But it wasn't Finn and it wasn't Poe and she just couldn't think about who it probably was because she could still feel the lightsaber pierce her body and cauterize her organs and she felt something tug at her mind and then push and she scrambled from the feeling as fast as she could, slamming up all her mental defenses as she gripped her small blaster in shaking hands, pointing it blindly into the darkness of her small room out of some desperate attempt to feel in control again.

Her gasps were the only sound she heard after that. Even the force felt distant and hazy.

And in spite of the fear coursing through her Rey felt a nearly overwhelming need to see Ben, to touch his face and feel the light within him she knew was there—the light she hoped was still there. All she'd felt in the dream was a darkness so black and consuming that even now she could feel it's inky tendrils wrapping around her, choking her.

Rey tried to center herself, to meditate and find the light within to cleanse herself of the lingering darkness beneath her skin, but as she closed her eyes all she could feel were the sounds of shouting and screams of pain and screams of anger and the smell of blood and smoke and burnt flesh and—

Lunging from her bed, she scrambled to the 'fresher and vomited.

As tears streamed down her face and bits of food and spit hung from her lips she felt something brush against her mind, then retreat, leaving an echo of regret and anguish in it's wake.

* * *

Rey didn't fall back asleep once she cleaned up and got her breathing under control and her heartbeat down, although the adrenaline rushing through her system told her she couldn't go back to sleep even if she tried.

She didn't want to think about the dream and the fact it was probably a memory, so she kept her mind busy reading the Jedi texts she'd stolen from Ahch-To (the blaster tucked within quick reach at her side), but the words kept blurring together and even the ones she read just didn't make any sense. She was supposed to learn this stuff from someone who could explain it's meanings to her with more clarity, but now she was stuck having to parse out the hidden wisdoms herself. It frustrated her to no end.

Better to be frustrated than think about the dream though.

As the chrono on the wall indicated that it was nearing a respectable time to be up, Rey blearily used the 'fresher (she was still getting used to all the knobs and special soaps Leia had secretly given her not too long ago) and got dressed for the day.

There wasn't much to do usually aside from try to study the Jedi texts, practice fighting (usually on her own but a couple times Finn gave it a go and they managed to have a decent spar until she swept his feet out one too many times and he called it quits), and wander the ship, unconsciously looking for things to scavenge or fix.

And it wasn't as if there was a shortage of things to fix or tinker with, the ship being an older Mon Calamari cruiser model, renamed _Amilyn_ after the late Vice-Admiral Amilyn Holdo. It had been sitting, unused and out of commission on an old Republic base on Mirrin Prime. They had made a quick trek to the planet after escaping Crait, contacted the base and begged for help. The Major in charge acquiesced almost immediately, still reeling from the destruction of the Hosnian system and what had been the heart of the Republic, giving them three T-85 X-wings (much to the absolute excitement of Poe), two StarFortress SF-17 bombers, and an old B-wing Starfighter. It wasn't much, but it was a start.

After a frenzied day of round-the-clock engineering they had managed to get the cruiser in flying condition, although most of the shuttles were gone and the aft cannons had been destroyed in a battle long since passed. Still, it was better than having everyone crammed on the _Falcon_, and with the recruits they had picked up on Mirrin Prime (before the First Order had arrived, blowing the city to pieces and resulting in the scar on Rey's neck) they needed the room.

Rey wasn't sure where they were going now, but she hardly cared as long as she was with her friends.

Occasionally Leia would seek her out and talk humorously about past shenanigans the men in her life had gotten into, "_and how I almost always had to blast our way out of whatever mess they'd managed to scrounge up_," and Rey greatly cherished these moments and stories, especially the ones about Ben in his childhood. Leia didn't regale these memories often, or around many other people. And lately she'd been less talkative around Rey, more pensive. There was a look in her eyes sometimes when Rey would catch her gaze that she couldn't quite read, and it made her a bit nervous.

It was the same look she was met with as she made her way to the bridge, having been sent for by Poe to join the morning meeting.

"Thank you for joining us, Rey." Leia began as they took their seats around a large holoscreen table.

"Of course." She smiled, hoping it came out genuine enough to cover her weary appearance. Leia gave a tight smile back, then addressed the meeting.

"Well, let's cut to the chase people. Our sources have confirmed that Kylo Ren has summoned his Knights."

Rey's blood froze in her veins. The room took on a blurry quality as multiple voices rose up from around the table and her mind raced with thoughts of blood and fire.

Admiral Nunes, a strict older man who never seemed to relax or smile was first to make himself heard.

"When?"

The Lieutenant pulled up a holovid showing a shaky recording of a shuttle beginning to dock in the hangar of the Finalizer. "The last report we got stated that they began arriving at his ship about fifty-two standard hours ago."

"How many are there?" Major Eskteraa asked.

"Six so far."

"Why is he summoning them now?"

Leia sat back. "We're not entirely sure, but it may have to do with his rise to Supreme Leader. No doubt he wants to keep his personal soldiers close at hand now that he's in the most hated position in the galaxy, but we can't rule out the possibility he's planning to use them for some other agenda."

Rey's fists clenched in her lap. _What are you up to Ben?_

More grainy images were pulled up of six dark figures, each in different locations and of varying picture quality, as if the photographers had been hasty to not get caught. The Knights varied in size and build, one clearly not human if the reptilian tail was any indication, and Rey even thought one of the others might be female. What they all had in common, though, were the dark hooded clothing, weapons that looked built for pain, and their terrifying black and silver masks, unique to each one.

A chilled silence descended upon the room. Kylo Ren had been a horrifying enemy all on his own, but to have six others trained in the same dark force? The destructive possibilities seemed endless.

Poe spoke up, face twisted in fear and anger. "Who are they? And where did they come from?"

The image of the bodies strewn about the huts in her dream made her close her eyes momentarily to block them out. Rey's mouth opened of it's own accord, her voice distant to her own ears. "They're Luke's old students." She caught Leia's knowing gaze and then looked away. "The one's Kylo didn't kill, at least. They joined him when he destroyed the Jedi temple."

"How do you know? Did Luke tell you this?" Poe asked.

Rey dug her nails into her palms. "Yes." Leia nodded to herself as the table's occupants exchanged various looks and whispers.

"They're trained in the dark side of the force, the way Kylo was." Rey continued saying.

Poe was looking as queasy as she felt. "If they fight and have powers anything like what I've seen of his, we're gonna need a lot more firepower to defeat them than what we've got now."

Leia gave him a small nod. "We're working on it. We still have our sources for weapons and ships, but without financial backing we won't get much of anything. We've sent out more bids for help from our allies, but they're really spooked by what happened to the Hosnian system."

"But Starkiller base was destroyed." Poe argued.

"I know that." Leia patiently replied. "And they know that. But they're worried the First Order might have something else up their sleeve. Hardly anyone knew about Starkiller until it was too late. Maker knows what else they could have been building besides that."

"Finn doesn't think there's anything else." Poe said, and Rey felt her hands relax at the mention of her friend.

Leia gave the pilot a sardonic look. "You of all people should know that not every soldier is privy to classified plans, Poe."

He nodded silently, a heavy understanding weighing his head and shoulders down. Rey had heard from secondhand sources what had gone down on the _Raddus_ while she'd been trying to convince Luke to help (and trying to get Ben to turn). From what it had sounded like, Poe Dameron, Finn, and Rose Tico had almost gotten the entire Resistance crew killed because of their foolish plan and inability to follow orders.

She'd actually slapped Finn when he'd told her how he'd tried to jump ship to keep her safe.

"_Don't you ever do anything like that again, Finn. No matter how much I appreciate it, there are more important things at stake now."_ She'd told him.

"_I know_." He'd replied soberly, and Rey remembered the tender way he'd been looking after Rose when they'd been on the Falcon, and she knew he wasn't going to run away from this war anymore.

This war that was getting costlier as time went on, in more ways than one.

"So how are we going to defeat someone as powerful as Supreme Leader Kylo Ren when he has surrounded himself with equally-powerful guards?"

Leia motioned silently to Rey. "They have their aces, and we have ours. I have every confidence that Rey will bring Kylo Ren down."

Rey looked at the General with a questioning frown, but the woman did not acknowledge her. _Have you really lost all hope in your son, Leia? Do you even deserve to have him back if he does turn?_

Admiral Nunes scoffed. "I thought we already discussed this. The girl is hardly trained. How can we expect her powers to even compete with his?"

Rey fumed, glaring openly at the man. "_The girl_ is training on her own now—with the Jedi texts— And I'm getting stronger every day." She almost added that her powers were technically already matched with Kylo's, but then she'd have to explain about their force connection and she knew that would only cause her more grief than it would help the situation, so she snapped her teeth shut.

"Rey's pretty powerful, Admiral." Poe said without any hesitance, his own frustration on her behalf making her heart a little lighter. "You should've seen the size of the boulders she lifted on Crait. It would've taken a hundred guys to move even just one of them, and she had about fifty floating in the air like they were made of Porg feathers."

"So she can lift some rocks," Nunes conceded snidely, "which may be helpful if we intend to crush Kylo Ren under stone. But seeing that there are no rocks on his ship, and he hasn't gone planet-side since he ascended…"

"I've beaten him in combat before." Rey argued, skin prickling with irritation. "On Starkiller base."

"Then why didn't you kill him?"

All eyes were on her as she fought for an answer that wouldn't pit the lot of them against her. Luckily Poe came to her rescue once again.

"The planet was collapsing on itself, Admiral. It's a miracle she got off it alive at all. I'm sure the next time Rey has a chance to get rid of Kylo Ren once and for all, she won't hesitate to take it."

He gave Rey a nod of confidence, but she could only give a tight smile in return.

"And," he added, "if what the First Order has been going on about on the holonet is true, she's the one who killed Snoke!"

_Shit._ This was a conversation she'd been trying to avoid since they'd reestablished a chain of command and found a new cruiser to make headquarters on. She'd avoided the question from Finn and outright ignored it from anyone else. But she couldn't avoid it any longer.

"Well?" Admiral Nunes quirked a sharp brow at her. "Is it true?"

Rey swallowed, looking around the room before settling her gaze on a point the table before her. "No." She murmured. She could feel Poe's confusion mixing with the disappointment from around the table. "Kylo killed him."

"Then why—"

The Admiral interrupted Poe. "You witnessed this?"

She nodded.

"So you're telling me you witnessed Kylo Ren kill Snoke, who was perhaps the most powerful being in the galaxy, and yet you managed to escape? Why were you there in the first place?"

Vice-Admiral Yaris spoke up from her seat. "We never did properly debrief you about what happened on the _Supremacy._ Did you draw lightsabers with him?"

She nodded slowly. "In a way, yes." It was the truth after all. She did fight with him but it was at his side, not against him.

"I'm sorry young Jedi," Vice-Admiral said, frowning, "but what exactly does that mean?"

Rey looked around at the faces staring at her and wished the force would open up and swallow her whole. Leia remained silent, her face impassive and unreadable—unhelpful. Even Poe was looking at her warily, the confidence from before gone. Nunes looked like he was about to squish a very bothersome bug.

She didn't want to lie anymore, knowing that the more lies became tangled the harder it was to keep up with them. She was also mindful of how they expected her to be a Jedi, and what it meant to be that person, and she was sure that lying was something Jedi weren't supposed to do.

So, taking a deep breath and steeling her nerve, she told them the truth. Mostly.

"I didn't go to the _Supremacy_ to kill Kylo Ren. I went there to save Ben Solo."

Leia's eyes fluttered closed briefly, pain and sadness and pride shining within them when she opened them. The reactions from everyone else were less than stellar.

"What—save Ben Solo?" Poe asked. "Who the hell is Ben Solo?"

"My son." Leia said simply. "Kylo Ren."

Poe's eyes widened as he sat back in astonishment, slack jawed, and ran his hands through his hair.

"_What_?" He leaned forward, hands on the table. "Who else knows about this?"

Everyone around the table raised a hand, prompting him to raise his in defense.

"Alright, alright, so I'm out of the loop, understandably so." He acquiesced to Leia, who nodded. "But this is also kindof a huge thing not to tell me. And Rey," he turned to her. "why would you try to save Kylo—Ben whoever? We've both seen how far gone he is—no offense, General."

Rey shook her head, leaning forward with a desperate plea in her voice. "But he's not totally gone. There's still light in him. I've seen it, _I've felt it._ Snoke ordered him to kill me, but he didn't. I don't know how he was able to trick him so well, but Ben turned the saber on Snoke instead, and—and saved my life. We fought Snoke's guards together and then…" _And then he told me I meant something to him and asked me to join him in ruling the galaxy._

"And he turned on you." Poe finished for her.

She shook her head sadly. "He turned on himself—"

Major T'vek interrupted this time. "So if he turned on you but you didn't fight him, what happened?"

The memory of their emotional exchange after defeating the red guards was one she'd visited often, and so it came easily to the forefront of her mind.

"_It's time to let old things die…"_

_ "Don't do this. Please don't go this way."_

_ "No, you're still holding on! Let go!"_

_ "…They were filthy junk traders, who sold you off for drinking money."_

_ "You come from nothing, you're nothing."_

_ "But not to me."_

_ "Rey, I want you to join me."_

_ "Please."_

Maker how her heart wrenches and tears apart and _burns_ when she thinks about it. She thought he would turn, had been so convinced of it because of the vision she'd had on Ahch-To. The utter disappointment and anguish she'd felt when she realized he was still entrenched in darkness in spite of her coming to save him bloomed anew in her chest.

She wondered often what would have happened if she hadn't tried to grab Luke's lightsaber, if she'd just turned and ran. Would he have tried to stop her by force? Would he have killed her then?

Or would she be there now, another 'guest' locked in chains, the Resistance dead and gone?

"Rey."

She jolted back into the present at her name. Her cheeks flushed as she realized she'd gotten lost in the memory and hadn't replied to the Major's question yet. She cleared her throat, choosing her words carefully.

"We fought over Luke's lightsaber, tearing it in two with the force. Then there was an explosion. From what I heard, I think it was when Vice-Admiral Holdo split the _Supremacy_ by going lightspeed with the Raddus. When I woke up, the only thing I could think about was getting off the ship and helping the fleet. So I took Snoke's escape pod—"

The Admiral broke in abruptly. "And what of Kylo Ren? Did he just let you leave?"

She swallowed. "He was unconscious when I left."

"You didn't kill him right then and there?"

She tensed, breathing in deeply to keep her temper from spiking. "Admiral Nunes, I may not be a fully trained Jedi, but I do know that killing an unarmed, _unconscious_ foe goes against everything the Jedi stand for. And even if I wasn't training to be a Jedi, I'm not cowardly enough to kill someone in such a way."

The Admiral's face blotched unattractively with red as he seethed.

Rey swept her grave gaze around the table, praying that they would understand.  
"There's still hope for him to come back from the darkness._ I know it._"

"Still hope?" Nunes laughed mockingly. "He's S_upreme Leader of the First Order_, and _you_ helped him get there."

The meaning behind his words hung like a threat in the air. _You're a traitor_.

Another voice echoed the word in the murky part of her brain and she felt the still-raw dream-memory of her flesh burning in her chest.

"Maybe I did." She confessed quietly. Her eyes hardened when she met his bright gaze. "But I will be the one to bring him back to the light. I will defeat Kylo Ren and in the process save Ben Solo, and end this war once and for all."

* * *

She left the meeting soon after that, having said what she had to and afraid to say anything more to condemn herself. Poe found her later on as she was talking with Finn and Rose about the particulars of thermal oscillators.

Without further preamble he dove right in as soon as he stormed up. "You can't be serious about saving Kylo Ren."

Finn jerked as if shocked. "Whoa, what?" His confused eyes met Rey's.

Poe continued on, ignoring him momentarily. "Rey, come on. The guy is a complete sociopath. Look what he did on Jakku, Takodana, and Crait!"

Rose put up a hand. "Hang on, who's trying to save what now?"

Poe stepped closer, voice lowering. "Rey said she went to the _Supremacy_ that day to save Kylo Ren."

Finn's face scrunched up. "Save him from what?"

"From the dark side of the force." Rey explained with a scowl, finally able to get a word in. "I really don't expect anyone to understand why this is so important, so could we just drop it?"

"Uh, no, Rey, we can't." Finn's face fell into the same confused-angry-disbelief that Poe had sported during the meeting. Rey's heart twisted in her chest but she kept her expression impassive.

Finn put a hand on her shoulder. "Rey, Kylo Ren killed Han Solo, _his own father,_ right in front of us. He almost killed you, and he almost killed me. I saw him cut down an old man on Jakku before having an entire village massacred. And who knows how many other innocents he's killed."

"Or tortured." Poe added while looking down, face hard.

"Yes, I know all of that." Rey snapped. "But if there's even the smallest chance that he could turn to our side, it could help us defeat the First Order for good."

"That's insane." Finn said, shaking his head. "You don't know him like I do, Rey."

"Oh, I think I do." She bit back. But how was she going to explain it? She couldn't, and the resulting strain of holding back everything she wanted to tell them was making the pipes and metal around them shake and creak.

At their wide-eyed looks she took a deep breath to calm herself.

Rose stood silently, a contemplative look on her face. "Finn, remember what I told you on Crait?"

His eyes blinked in remembrance and he shook his head with a frown. "This is not the same, Rose. It's _not_."

Poe looked between the two, confusion written on his face.

"Wait, what'd you say on Crait?"

Rey sighed, feeling a pounding ache in her head that belied her lack of sleep and spent mental energy. Before either Rose or Finn could say anything she spoke up.

"Look, I'm really tired, and I'm really not in the mood to try and explain something that you'll never, ever understand, alright? You may have seen the force in action but _I feel it_—inside myself and in everyone else. Including Ben Solo. And I have felt that there is still light inside him, desperate to be let out. I almost had him on the _Supremacy,_ and there have been moments since Crait when he's come closer to the light."

Poe narrowed his eyes. "How do you know that?"

Rey felt like screaming. "Just—nevermind!" She angrily pushed past the trio to head back to her quarters. "I'm going to go meditate, since apparently nothing else I do seems right to anybody around here."

"Rey—"

"Hey, don't say that—"

She ignored them, force-closing the door behind her with a slicing wave of her hand. No one followed her.

* * *

Before going back to her quarters she stopped by the kitchens to sneak a piece of bread and dried fruit from the pantry. Out of habit she broke them each in half, depositing one half into her food stash box and eating the other pieces slowly.

She tried to meditate but the headache was proving to be too much of a distraction. Remembering how she used to get dehydration headaches back on Jakku, she went to the 'fresher and took long gulps of water from the faucet. It helped take the edge off, but the pulsing aches remained a constant annoyance.

She thought about taking a nap when she felt the force shudder and surge within and around her, and the noise of the ship dim to a hum.

Between one heartbeat and then next Ben shimmered into view, his large frame clothed in his usual neck to boot black garb. However today there was also a billowing cape that hung from his wide shoulders, giving him a regal look that went along with his new title. He appeared even more massive as a result, even standing halfway turned away from her, and Rey wished that her room wasn't so small. _But at least I'm in my room this time, and not…_

The hut from the dream came to mind, and she quickly banished it from her thoughts. She didn't want to think about the dream.

Ben for his credit, having turned his head towards her as soon as the connection formed, was trying to appear impassive, but she could feel the whirling emotions inside him. He wanted to say something about the nightmare, to maybe reassure her somehow, or reassure himself that she was okay.

_ Did you search for me beside you when you woke up, Ben?_ She thought. _Like you did the last time?_

Last time.

Heat rose to her cheeks as she recalled everything that had happened between them—everything that had been said. How could she have been so stupid, to make herself so vulnerable in front of a man like Kylo Ren? What if anyone in the Resistance found out? She recalled Finn and Poe's thinly veiled looks of betrayal at just the idea that she wanted to help Ben and felt her heart plummet. How would they look at her if they knew she'd been in bed with him, baring souls with their hated enemy?

And what was even happening between them? Were they enemies, or friends, or…what? She had been so convinced of who he was, but now she realized she didn't know him as well as she thought she did. And he hardly knew her either. One foray into each other's minds wasn't enough to say they knew each other, although their shared understanding of loneliness bridged the gap a little. It was just…so confusing.

She didn't know how to proceed, especially with him looking every bit the Supreme Leader of the First Order, so she said the first thing that came to mind.

"Why were you so angry last time? I didn't mean to throw us apart like that; it was clearly an accident."

But apparently it was the wrong thing to say because all at once the trepidation in his side of the bond disappeared and he rounded on her, eyes blazing. She took a step back in wary surprise.

"That's exactly the reason." He spat. "You have all of this power, and no way to control it. Luke's gone, so he can't teach you. And no doubt you'll still refuse my offer, even though you wouldn't—" He stopped himself, lips forming a hard line as he breathed through flared nostrils. He looked away, jaw tensing.

Rey's eyes narrowed. "I wouldn't what?" He took a shuddering breath in and out, and she took a step closer. "Go on, say it. I wouldn't what?"

He looked up, indecision cutting through his anger.

"_Say it_." Rey mocked, knowing full well how throwing his words back at him would spur him into compliance, if only by virtue of stirring up his anger. By the stony darkness settling his expression, she knew it had worked.

He leaned closer an inch, and Rey realized that they'd somehow moved towards each other enough that he could loom over her quite impressively.

"You refuse to let me teach you," he ground out, "even though you wouldn't have your powers if it wasn't for me."

Furious incredulity clawed it's way up her spine, causing her whole body to tense and her fists to clench. It took all her will not to try and punch him in the face, knowing she would end up feeling it as well, and she also didn't want to be the first one to bridge the connection in order to purposefully hurt the other.

Physically hurt, at least. Although he had bruised her arm that one time.

"What the _hell_ are you talking about?" She seethed. "You didn't _give me_ my powers."

"That's not what I meant."

"Then what did you mean?" Suddenly something lit up in her memory, and she felt her expression twist in disgust. Her face and her feelings—that were no doubt projecting loudly across the bond—had him remain in silence, knowing she'd answered her own question.

She scoffed. "You mean what Snoke said. About light meeting darkness—your darkness. My light."

He nodded faintly.

She glared up at him, teeth grinding, fists shaking at her sides. He glanced down at them and she could sense a wariness drifting across the bond, as well as see him tense up as if for a fight.

She thought about it. She really did. She imagined how good it would feel to shut him up—him and his _stupid_ ideas from that _horrible_ creature he called Master—by directly putting her fist to his mouth, but instead she shook her head and laughed humorlessly.

This seemed to only make him more wary, although his eyes tightened in anger as well.

"There you go again," She motioned to him with her hands as she took a few steps back. Space would be the only thing keeping her from lashing out at his form the next time he spoke.

"Telling me I'm worthless without you."

His face lost it's anger, brows drawing together as his emotions swirled. Rey tried to block them out, not wanting her red hot outrage to be dampened by whatever sad thing was twisting in his heart.

He started shaking his head. "You're not—"

"Aren't I?" She snapped. "Aren't I 'nobody'? Aren't I 'nothing?' But, oh, here you are, with all your power and mighty bloodline to pick me up out of the dust and sand and give me a place in the galaxy. A place in this _story_."

"Rey—"

She motioned wildly with her arms, cutting him off again. "And of course! You're the only one who can teach me, in the _entire galaxy_! Except if your little theory is true about light rising up to defeat darkness, then there must be other Jedi out there—or at least other light-side users, since you've got _six Knights of Ren body guards now_ who are obviously strong with the dark side!"

The air stilled around Ben, then crackled with dark energy as his expression became thunderous. It was so much like the dream that Rey instinctively took another small step back, glancing for a second at the lightsaber at his hip.

"Have you been _spying_ on me?" He ground between clenched teeth.

Now it was his turn to give off violent waves and Rey's turn to become wary. Her rage fizzled into something that felt like regret as she realized she shouldn't have let that information slip. And now she was stuck between letting him think she'd been using their bond for espionage, or confessing by omission that there were Resistance spies among his ships.

It hurt her too much for him to think she was capable of taking advantage of him like that, so without thinking it through she chose the latter.

"No, Ben." She implored brokenly, the fight leeching out of her, leaving her feeling worn down and empty. "I would never use our connection to do something like that. How could I? You'd know immediately that I was there."

His eyes narrowed.

She took a step forward. "I wouldn't betray your trust like that."

The accusation still in his eyes told her he didn't believe her.

"There's not many people I can trust anymore Rey."

"Is that why you summoned them? Do you trust them?"

He looked down, his own anger abating as he breathed.

She took another step, her voice gentling into earnestness. "You can trust_ me,_ Ben."

"Can I?" He asked hoarsely, heated eyes meeting hers. "Or will you turn on me again the second your precious Resistance is in trouble?"

Rey sighed in exasperation. "I already told you, I won't sacrifice my friends. Not for anything."

His dark bangs fell in front of his eye as he leaned down, just inches from her face. She felt the urge to sweep them back with her hand, but held herself in check. She wasn't sure they'd be able to touch anyways; there was a hazy quality to him that told her the connection had them both firmly on their own sides, only able to see and hear each other.

Even so, his breath buffered the wisps of hair around her face as he spoke lowly. "You don't even know them, and they don't know you. Not like I do. You don't owe them anything."

Rey shook her head. "It doesn't matter if I don't know them, they're innocent people who want what's right for the galaxy."

His eyes bore into hers unrelentingly. "I want what's right for the galaxy too, Rey. And giving control to a bunch of degenerates isn't that."

She moved back as if in recoil, putting space between them again. She was running out of room though—the door was at her back. "Degenerates?" She asked, eyes narrowing and voice steady, yet laced with something dark. His jaw clenched and she could sense he knew he'd said the wrong thing.

"_Degenerates_?" She said again, louder. "A bunch of nobodies, you mean? I guess that's why I fit in so well, right? A Nobody from Jakku and her merry band of Nobodies from everywhere else."

His voice rose with his frustration. "That's the thing, Rey. You're not nobody. _You're not nothing_. You're better than them, better than all of them! Rey," he stepped close, closing the distance between them again and imploring her with his dark eyes. "If you had taken my hand the day I killed Snoke, I would have burned down the whole First Order for you."

"Be that as it may, my friends were in danger—"

"Friends? _Friends_?" He laughed bitterly. "They don't trust you, they think you're a freak. And no matter how much you think they care about you, you know that if they had to choose between saving you and saving the Resistance, you'd be abandoned again like you were all those years ago on Jakku."

"You're wrong!" She cried, embarrassed to feel tears in her eyes. "Finn and Poe would come through for me. Chewie and Rose too. Just because they don't understand my powers doesn't mean they don't trust me. They trust me with their lives, and I trust them with mine. I can't imagine you understanding what it's like to have friends, as you've killed or tried to kill anyone who's ever given a _damn_ about you, so shut your _kriffing_ mouth Ben Solo. You don't know what you're talking about."

He fumed, breathing heavily through his nose, jaw working. His eyes were liked molten earth as they bore into her own.

"Mark my words, Rey," he finally growled. "As soon as they find out about our bond they will persecute you like a First Order spy. Where will your_ friends_ be then?"

Abruptly the bond closed just as she opened her mouth to say something back. As the sounds of the ship resumed around her and the force settled into a quiet hum, her hands eased out of their fists. Her other muscles and tendons remained taught however.

She realized that they never talked about the dream, but she knew she didn't have the stomach for it yet. Might never have the strength to accept what he did all those years ago to those people he might have called friends at one point.

Ben was going to need more help than she originally thought if he was ever going to atone for all the horrors he'd wrought upon the galaxy.

And his darkness was growing again. She could feel it. No doubt the presence of the other Knights was bringing it back, and she had a sinking feeling that the emotions she'd sensed from him of confidence, pride, and purpose had been because of them somehow.

He was slipping away from her, and she wasn't sure how long she could follow him into that dark cave before she lost herself in it too.


	4. The Knights of Ren

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In this chapter we see the past week or so through Kylo's POV, and have some new characters introduced :)

* * *

Kylo Ren didn't so much as move through the corridors of the _Finalizer_ as he did impress himself upon them like a silent, brooding storm passing through a narrow valley. When he went from his quarters to the bridge, the war room, or the training complex, anyone caught in his path quickly stepped to the side, scarcely breathing, standing to attention until well after his cold presence had gone. At this point no one wanted to be on the wrong end of his ire. The huge dents in the walls, ceilings, and control panels from bodies shoved into them with a force no normal man could project were daily reminders that Supreme Leader Kylo Ren's ultimate authority was not to be questioned anymore—and no part of the ship or it's crew was to be out of place or lacking—if it ever was before.

Prior to his ascension to Supreme Leader he'd not been officially in any position to punish or command First Order troops, having existed outside the military ranks as Snoke's apprentice and as the Master of the Knights of Ren. He had left the punishing and commanding to General Hux, who did so more often out of spite than out of any sort of deference to Kylo's nebulous authority. And so, to avoid overstepping his faint boundaries, Kylo had typically resorted to slashing at the nearest inanimate object with his lightsaber whenever overcome with rage at the inadequacies of the First Order military.

But no longer. He was the Supreme Leader of the First Order now, which meant all members deferred to him and his ultimate authority. Even so, General Hux was continuing to prove that total submission would be a painful process for some more than others. Every time Hux failed to be anything other than completely obedient Kylo would unleash his anger and frustration on the nearest attendant or stormtrooper, effectively using them as whipping boys to keep himself from killing Hux outright. Unfortunately he needed the insufferable man, especially since Captain Phasma was still recovering from her grievous injuries and Captain Peavey had been sent to oversee the recovery of the fleet.

If Kylo wasn't in the mood for the General's underhanded attempts at insubordination and undercutting before, he definitely wasn't in the mood for it now. Every sly remark, every doubtful look, every hesitation to acquiesce or obey was just another small act of treason to add to the mounting list of betrayals Kylo has had to endure in his life. Most notably, every one of Hux's reminded him of the ultimate betrayal: Rey's. And he did _not_ like to be reminded of that.

He'd much rather remember the way she had morosely touched the scar she'd given him, or the way she'd taken his hand again (two more times, in fact) even though it wasn't when he'd needed her to the most, or how her body had felt pressed against his so tightly—

_No,_ he shouldn't be remembering those things either. They were a distraction. They tore him apart inside with how_ good_ they felt, a stark contrast from how horrible and angry (and occasionally, blissfully detached) he usually felt day-to-day. With her he can almost forget what it had felt like when Han Solo's life had ceased to exist, and the part of Kylo's conflicted heart that was supposed to die with him had merely been ripped open and spread like a carcass flayed. The torment afterwards has been like that of a phantom limb, torn painfully from the body so that all that was left was a constant torturous reminder of what had been lost.

He didn't want to feel that anymore. He wanted to forget.

With her he can almost forget, although it hadn't been that way in the beginning. Back then she'd practically made it her mission to remind him every Force-encounter what he had done and what he was because of it. Their peculiar bond had been quite complicit in that. But lately she'd been holding her anger and hatred back, even when he'd told her of his horrible dream. It gave him some hope, but for what he wasn't quite sure.

His force connection with Rey had been a marvel, a wonder even, when they had first discovered it those weeks ago. It was proof that the small something he'd felt pass between them in the interrogation room on Starkiller base—and even before that, when he'd found her on Takodana—hadn't been inconsequential. And there had been a familiarity then, like meeting her on that planet hadn't been for the first time.

Maybe it hadn't.

The possibility of what it meant had immediately put her into his small circle of 'things that are to be pursued at all cost', where his quest to find Luke Skywalker had resided until the murderous Jedi had died (which was another thing he tried not to think about because it usually left him wondering 'why' on an endless loop, too afraid to actually find the answer but knowing it all the same). Even his desire to follow Darth Vader's footsteps and finish what he'd begun all those years ago was technically almost complete, leaving Rey the last thing on the list.

So far getting her to his side was proving to be his most challenging test yet. How was he to ignore the pull to the light when she was the first deep connection he'd made in his life and also the source of all the good things he'd ever felt in the past fifteen-odd years? How can he ignore the utter completeness and peace he feels whenever their skin touches, or when she looks at him with anything other than hate or fear, or when she calls him by his birth name—a name he thought belonged to a dead man—in her sweet voice?

And yet, she was also the source of his pain, his anger. He'd almost forgotten her betrayal as he'd clung to her like a child the other night and she had confessed her equally pathetic longing for him._ What a pair they were._

And when she'd told him how she cared for him—for him!—even in spite of all the terrible things he's done, he'd felt an overwhelming need to somehow absorb everything she was through every pore on his body—to pour himself into her as much as she filled him up, until they weren't two souls in two bodies but one soul between two bodies. He had no idea where the need came from or what would have happened had he been able to actually attempt it, because then she'd stopped him with her pitiful grasp on the force (although it wasn't so pitiful when her traitor friend had called out and she'd panicked, causing her hold on the force to react in kind, and their bodies had flown apart nearly explosively).

The moment he'd landed on the floor of his room in a tangle of limbs and sheets he had remembered how she'd chosen the Resistance over him, and it was like she'd done it all over again.

He had been furious, yes, and he'd wanted to hurt something, someone, _anything_. He'd wanted to put his lightsaber to steel and wire and flesh and bone and create outside of himself all of the dark and twisted things he felt inside. And as he sat on his floor, body trembling with this overwhelming need to create destruction, he'd had an epiphany.

She had chosen her side, twice now in fact. Now it was time for him to choose his. To put aside his childish need for her, his pathetic longing for her connection, and become the man—the leader—he was meant to be. The galaxy was ripe for the taking, and here he had been with the poised sickle, still reeling like a weak child from the events of the past month to make any grand move of domination. The time was now to reap what had been sown.

It was then that he'd decided to officially summon the Knights of Ren.

After they had learned of Snoke's demise, a few of the Knights—those who were in locations that allowed them to be up-to-date on the holonet news—had sent inquiries through the First Order channels about their respective missions given to them by Snoke. Were they to continue following through on the old commands or stop and wait for further instruction from the new Supreme Leader?

When he took the throne Kylo had a message sent back telling them to stay on their quests until further notice. He'd known what their missions were, and the prospect of gaining what Snoke had sought had been intoxicating.

But now he wanted them by his side. And unlike Rey, they would not be able to refuse his hand.

As the days cycled on, the call signs came back one by one, confirming his command and detailing their ETA at the _Finalizer_. General Hux had been incensed that Kylo had summoned them without his knowing, to which Kylo had unleashed his wrath on a nearby empty chair, crushing the metal with his power to avoid doing so to the man himself. It was a warning, a reminder that Kylo did as he pleased now and answered to no one. His fury hadn't abated for a long while, remaining as a dark presence in his mind as he stood stiffly on the bridge and watched the salvaging of the _Supremacy._

The days passed uneventfully, and without any more random connections with the force. Instead, Kylo found his senses triggered every now and then by what he came to determine were Rey's feelings. At least, they were fragments—whispers of a hazy shape of what she was probably feeling at the time. It was like trying to catch smoke when he attempted to concentrate on the force and pull them closer, to read them more clearly. And yet, he didn't want to feel them at all.

Her little bubbles of happiness, the rumble of determination, even the spike of her anger reminded him that she wasn't beside him, feeling happy or determined or angry. She was living a life with people who didn't deserve her, although he hardly deserved her either. He was a monster and a murderous snake and a killer of the worst kind, but at least he knew what she was worth.

They didn't.

They had no idea what she was capable of, or how incredible she really was.

Kylo clenched his teeth, willing thoughts of her and thoughts of himself to go away by focusing on his anger instead. Anger was good, anger helped him focus, helped remind him what made him strong.

There was no dark and painful presence of Snoke in his head anymore, reminding him of his failures and of his potential, whispering shadowy things and showing him the wisdom of his inky words. No, Kylo was strangely empty now. Uncomfortably so, in fact. He hadn't been without that presence in his mind since he could remember, and with it gone he felt his aloneness even more starkly than before. Nevertheless, the teachings Snoke had bestowed on him of the dark side of the force had helped him get this far, and he would continue to rely on them—and soon, his Knights—as he executed his grand plans.

For now he will keep storming his way through the ship, filling it with his dark signature until it becomes suffocating for everyone on board. He hoped that maybe with enough of it built up, the light torturing his heart will snuff out with it.

* * *

The first Knights were due back at the ship within the next two cycles, and Kylo found himself on edge. It had been quite a long time since they had all convened in the same place at the same time, although he wasn't worried about anything as elementary as a clashing of personalities. His worries centered around whether or not they would accept that Snoke had been killed by some untrained girl when they had seen and felt for themselves the unfathomable power that the deformed Leader had wielded with mastery. Hux barely accepted the story, although he had yet to confront Kylo about it and that alone was another thing to raise Kylo's suspicions and paranoia.

Naturally, Kylo was the Master of the Knights, which by itself would ensure their loyalty and obedience to him. But the thought still remained that one of them might not take to his ascension and challenge him on it. He would defeat the fool, of course. He was the Master for a reason, but the act of killing one of his own Knights would sow the seeds for more dissent, and he couldn't have that.

Kylo felt like one more betrayal would undo him permanently at this point.

As he stormed his way through the ship from the bridge, practically vibrating with uneasy energy, Kylo was intercepted by the redheaded bane of his existence.

"_Supreme Leader_," General Hux nasally clipped, and Kylo once again wondered if the man was saying it in a way that was borderline mocking as Hux moved to match the Master's gait.

"General Hux," He bit back, barely gracing him with a glance, "I was expecting an update about the Knights thirty minutes ago. You're late." They both knew it wasn't Hux's job to do this, but Kylo felt the need to blame the man anyways.

"My apologies, Leader Ren." Hux said with barely concealed irritation. "But I was—"

"I don't want to hear your excuses, General." Kylo snapped. "When each of them arrive I want you to personally meet them in the hangar and escort them to their quarters."

"Yes, _Supreme Leader_." He said through clenched teeth. "Will you require anything else for them? Perhaps a full welcome party with trumpets blaring—"

With an angry flick of his wrist Kylo sent the two troopers walking towards them across Hux's path—causing him to have to jolt to a stop—and into the wall to their left. All movement in the hallway froze as the two soldiers crumpled to the ground. The General looked down at his dazed troops in fearful distaste, then up to catch Kylo's blazing gaze.

After a moment of tense silence Kylo unclenched his jaw.

"My patience is wearing thin, General," He hissed, hoping that the heat of his glare and the venom in his voice was enough to finally remind the man where his place was. Hux stood ramrod straight, seemingly not backing down but Kylo could feel his trepidation like a cold hand on his chest. It satisfied him more than he'd care to admit.

The Supreme Leader took a step closer to the General, and even though they were about the same height Kylo knew his own form was towering in the corridor cramped with dark energy.

"You'll oversee their arrival, General, and you'll give my Knights whatever they require."

Hux's jaw tensed, his neck and pale cheeks stained with the red of his mixed emotions.

"As you command,_ Supreme Leader_."

With that Kylo continued on, dismissing him as he swept down the hallway.

* * *

Snoke had never been the kind to leave his personal quarters or his throne room on the _Supremacy_ for anything. Although he had been strong in the Force, his body had been weak and sickly, forcing him to remain close to his small comforts and his caretakers. If he wanted to see someone or speak with them, he summoned them or spoke to them through the holos.

Kylo Ren was not sickly. He did not need people to come to him, although he had enjoyed making Hux run around the ship like a simple servant. No, Kylo was used to moving around and getting what he wanted by his own hand and efforts, which is why he was seen much more often in the corridors and the bridge on the _Finalizer_ than Snoke ever was on the _Supremacy_.

At first it had been to reassert his dominant presence on board. Kylo wanted everyone to see him and know that even though he hadn't been among the ranks before, he was in them now and he was at the top. If there was any question about why he was in charge, he wanted to nip it in the bud as quickly as possible.

Today, however, what drew him into the bowels of the ship was something else. He'd walked towards this area and by it several times in the past weeks when the usual desk work and strategy meetings were finished. By that time the urge get up and walk about this level of the ship (if only to quell his restless energy) was too strong to resist, but he hadn't gone inside until today.

The armory on the _Finalizer_ was not as exuberant as the mega-assembly line factory that was on the _Supremacy,_ but it provided standard armor and blasters for the storm troopers, as well as supplied various other weapons and droids for the rest of the ship.

Kylo knew the man in charge of the _Finalizer_ armory—Captain Inder—well enough after coming to him often to find specific parts needed for the construction and upkeep of his lightsaber. Still, they had never particularly bonded, especially since Inder had seen more than once what Kylo was capable of when angered near a droid. The captain kept a wary distance, same as everyone else, but there was a level of respect Kylo felt from him sometimes that probably came from their mutual appreciation of the craft of weapons-building.

"Supreme Leader," Inder said in small surprise, standing quickly to attention by his workbench as Kylo swept into the large room.

"Captain Inder." Kylo eyed him silently as he considered the short man. Then, having assessed him to a level of content, Kylo began noting the projects laying about.

After a long moment of silence the captain hesitantly spoke up.

"Is…there something I can do for you, my Lord?"

Kylo glanced at him. "Perhaps."

He picked up a black piece that looked like it could be part of a DLT-19 heavy blaster rifle and examined it thoughtfully. Inder waited patiently, if a little tensely, for Kylo to continue.

Kylo wasn't sure what to say now that he was here, since his lightsaber did not need anything at the moment and there weren't any really pressing issues with any armory operations. Finally he put the piece down and turned to the captain, blurting out the first thing that came to mind.

"You were the one who repaired Captain Phasma's armor."

Inder looked sideways for a second and gave a hesitant nod. "I commissioned her repairs through a connection I have with a specialist in the First Order Department of Military Research, yes. Because of the…uniqueness…of her customized chromium plated pieces, we could not repair them here as we don't have the facilities. But I sent the specifications and schematics for the repairs."

Kylo nodded, face stoic. "I see."

Inder kept eye contact in spite of the growing unease Kylo could sense growing inside him.

The man took a small breath. "Her armor is quite exquisite, is it not?"

"It is."

Another uneasy pause. "Are you interested perhaps in something similar commissioned for yourself, my Lord?"

Kylo's jaw tensed and he looked at Inder with hooded eyes that barely hid his annoyance. "I have no interest in anything so flashy."

The captain swallowed and nodded. "Perhaps something else then? I am at your disposal."

It was at this point that Kylo realized he had no idea what he wanted or why he had been drawn to this place. Or, at least, he _knew_, but something held him back from it all the same. It was ridiculous, this sudden nervousness and uncertainty. But he couldn't ignore the slithering voice in the back of his head taunting him for what he craved, so with a murmured "No," Kylo made to leave.

"Captain Phasma sends her regards." He grumbled further as he swept past Inder. As he reached the doors the small man spoke up suddenly.

"I know her injuries required several prostheses, which I took in to account with the repairs, but it is a small miracle that Captain Phasma has made such a recovery, is it not?"

Kylo halted, eyes flashing as he slowly looked back at the man. A wave of dark energy oozed from him as he sneered.

"Other great leaders have suffered _much worse_, and it is not by some 'miracle' fashioned by some false deity that they survived. It was by the might of their _own will and power."_

Inder blanched and inclined his head demurely. "Of course, my Lord."

Kylo glared at his bowed head, itching to put his lightsaber through the projects that Inder had obviously been spending a lot of time on. Itching to show him the power he had so casually insulted.

But that was what children did, and he wasn't a child.

He _wasn't._

Muscles tight he turned and left instead, the door hissing shut behind him.

* * *

The first Knight arrived as Kylo was meditating before his grandfather's melted helmet. He had been searching desperately for the guidance of the Sith lord ever since he became Supreme Leader, but had yet to hear or feel anything from the dark ancestor.

_ Where are you, Grandfather? I need your council. There is much to do for me to finish what you started._

But in spite of Kylo's deep meditation and focus on the dark Force around him, Darth Vader remained silent yet again. Kylo didn't understand why he was being ignored. Was it his connection with Rey? Did Grandfather disapprove of his conflicted heart, or perhaps of his betrayal to Snoke? He didn't know, and it weighed heavily on his mind. Dejected, Kylo got up, ignoring his stiff muscles, and gave one last lingering look to the dark artifact before leaving the room.

Kylo could sense it when Dyarron Ren arrived, and he knew he should be down in the hangar to greet him. Hux was no replacement for their Master, and Kylo knew one of the Knights was bound to be offended by the lack of official greeting (and probably double-offended to be greeted by the General instead), but something kept him to his quarters.

One by one the other Knights came. Kylo sat at his desk and watched the holovids of the hangar through his access to the security feeds, the buzzing under his skin growing for every one of them that stepped off their ships and onto the _Finalizer_ durasteel. As they arrived, Hux greeted each of them with a small entourage of troops and officers, then stiffly led them away. The only snag in the formality was when Cseenan Ren arrived and made to claw the General after the man had said something to him. Luckily Dyarron and Visser Ren had been there to pull him away, or General Hux would have likely become the Barabel's next meal.

Tomaxx and Zhin-Tok Ren arrived after that, with Torca Ren the only Knight missing. However it wasn't too long until her small craft warped into space just outside the hangar door, flying into the area at breakneck speed only to bring the shuttle to a quick stop above the crowd. The blowback from her engines caused several troops and officers to be blown to the floor, hats and hair flying in the heated wind. She hovered for a moment and then set down in the open space provided.

Kylo shook his head, a ghost of a smile playing on his lips at such a dangerous maneuver. Torca was the best pilot of the Knights, and although her flying lacked grace she made up for it by efficiency. He was glad she hadn't used her usual signature move in her approach or there would have been more casualties.

_No doubt I'll hear a complaint from Hux about this._

With all the Knights on board, Kylo took a moment to reinforce his mental shields and gather himself mentally before he called for the troops stationed outside his rooms.

"Please inform the Knights that they are required in the council room." And then, as an afterthought, added, "Without their masks, or their weapons."

The two guards nodded with "Right away, sir," and then left.

The council room aboard the _Finalizer_ was no throne room the likes of which Snoke had sat or projected himself in, but then again Kylo was not one for such blatant shows of grandeur. The room was big, with the wall opposite the door being one large pane of transparisteel, and on the left a long holotable sat with twenty chairs, but that was it. No red tapestries, no throne, no Praetorian guards. Kylo didn't need any of that to prove he was powerful.

There was enough room for him to be able to fight if things came to it, although he hoped they would submit to his new authority willingly. And if somehow the bond connected and they found out about Rey he decided he would have to kill them. He knew they would not understand her importance, or understand the bond. He wouldn't blame them their decision to try to subvert him should they discover it before he has time to explain it, because he knows he would have the same reaction if any of them were found to have some kind of Force connection to the enemy. It was a delicate matter he needed to hide until such a time when explaining it didn't end in a saber duel.

The door slid open as Kylo was standing, looking out across the stars and the length of the Insurgent-class Star Destroyer he commanded. He cleared his mind of any thoughts of Rey and the connection as he straightened his spine. His hand brushed against the lightsaber at his hip as he turned, cape fluttering at his ankles.

"Master Kylo Ren." Came a raspy voice through sharp teeth as the Barabel came forward, took to his knee, and bowed his scaly head.

"Cseenan Ren." Kylo greeted. He paused, then pondering aloud, "What happened to your tail?" It was dangerous to make comments about the shortness of Barabel tails, and, in fact, 'shorttail' was the worst insult one could say to them. Kylo was feeling particularly daring.

The limb in question twitched, the end no longer tapered to a point but blunt and several inches shorter than before. Cseenan's clawed hands tightened into fists as rage pulsed from him.

"Someone tried to slash it off, my lord." He looked up, black eyes gleaming. "It was the last thing they did before I ripped out their throaty bits and watched them drown in their own blood."

Another hiss from the door and Tomaxx Ren stepped into the room, the blue of his skin and the glowing red of his eyes in contrast with the dark colors of his tunic and cloak.

"His balance is off because of it." He said casually, coming to stop several feet to Cseenan's left.

Cseenan sneered at him. "It'll grow back, unlike your puny man-limbs when I rip them from your body, _Jewel._"

The Chiss crossed his arms. "As if I'd let you get close enough for that. And how did you manage to get anything done on your assignment with your repulsive breath likely giving your position away?"

Cseenan stood. "Why don't you side-up a little closer and I'll show you?"

Dyarron Ren's massive form and deep voice filled up the doorway. "Master Kylo doesn't want to hear your bickering, lads."

"It's 'Supreme Leader' Kylo now, though, isn't it?" Torca grumbled as she pushed in after him roughly.

"He's still our Master." The hulking man argued as he moved to let her pass.

Kylo could feel frustration and irritation roiling off of his Knights in waves. It caused his own temper to simmer beneath his stony facade.

"Why are you all so unbalanced?" He asked, and Cseenan's neck scales bristled.

"You're one to talk—"

The metal chairs and table rattled with Kylo's outrage at the disrespect from the Barabel, quieting whatever retort was next.

_"I will not be spoken to that way!"_ He thundered, the Force of his fury pulsing outwards and pushing everyone back a few steps.

All at once the Knights seemed to remember who they were arguing in front of and as one bent a knee, heads bowed.

"Forgive me, Master." Cseenan rasped. "In my anger I forgot my place."

"You were not the only one." Kylo growled through gritted teeth.

"Forgive us." Tomaxx repeated lowly. "We were expecting to be greeted by you, Supreme Leader, not the General. He is as insufferable as ever and it has affected us."

They waited, bodies tense, as Kylo cast his heavy gaze upon them. At this point Snoke would have reminded them very painfully who they were acting so callously in front of. They had learned quickly what behavior was allowed in Snoke's presence, having felt his electric power coursing through their bodies, burning their nerve endings and tearing up their minds. None of them could forget that kind of agony.

Kylo clenched and unclenched his fists, then took a shuddering breath and tried to bring his temper back down. He looked down at Cseenan Ren's bowed head.

"Your anger should focus you, keep your mind clear and sharp. Only a _child_ would let it control him." His gaze swung to Tomaxx. "And as for my lack of presence in receiving you, I need not explain to you my reasons, only that I had important matters to attend to. If you allow Hux to affect you, you are giving him power over you. He does not deserve that power. Now let us be done with this." He gave a dismissive wave of his hand, cape flapping open slightly. Torca's eyes fell on his saber and then momentarily caught his gaze before she looked back down.

The door hissed open once more, revealing Visser Ren and Zhin-Tok Ren, a cloud of resentment and aggravation around them as their loud voices trailed off into silence. They'd obviously been arguing about something, but as Kylo reached out his senses to probe their minds on the content, he felt them pull up their mental shields and block him out. In spite of the paranoia that flared in his breast, Kylo didn't want to antagonize them by breaking through their minds when he so desperately needed them on his side, so he retreated. He would interrogate them about it later.

They entered the room and stiffly dropped to a knee behind the others. Kylo waited a beat before addressing them all.

"Welcome, Knights of Ren. It's been quite a long time since we were all gathered together like this. There's much to talk about. Rise." They all stood, eyes centered on him once more. Kylo looked at each of them, taking in how they had evolved in the time since they'd all been together.  
Dyarron had grown out a beard, the hint of rusty red different from the dark brown hair cropped short on his head. Torca had shorn the sides of her own skull, leaving the top long and dyed red and amber in stripes. The shock of color was out of place, but Kylo decided it suited her somehow. Zhin-Tok hadn't changed much, his black hair still in shoulder-length cords, although Kylo could see a new scar on the olive skin of his jaw. Visser was still boyishly attractive with his blond hair and blue eyes, although Kylo knew there was nothing innocent or boyish about how Visser interrogated enemies. Cseenan was as he always looked, minus a few inches on his tail, the ashy brown of his scaly skin and head plates a little more nicked but otherwise still blaster proof as always. And Tomaxx was the same, black hair short, blue skin blemish-free and eyes glowing like the red plasma of his lightsaber. They were all in battle-worn black, rips and holes from blasters and other weapons haphazardly stitched or patched over. They were a rugged group, although Kylo couldn't help but think they looked more haggard than anything. They deserved better, and he was in a position to make sure they reflected their statuses.

Finished with his inspection, Kylo continued. "There's been a great many changes since we last saw each other. I'm sure you've felt the effects in the Force. Leader Snoke is dead. Luke Skywalker…is dead." Several heads nodded at that, righteousness and old anger among the eyes Kylo met. He continued.

"The Republic is gone. The Resistance is in shambles. And the First Order is now in a position to finally bring stability to the galaxy." Kylo turned to look out at the stars, imagining a galaxy that was under First Order rule, under _his_ rule.

"For so many years we have been hiding away in the Unknown Regions of space, keeping to the shadows to avoid the stranglehold of the Republic's Galactic Concordance." His tone became biting as his anger grew. "As Knights of Ren our strength and our power was never fully known, never fully realized. Snoke used us to carry out his will in secret—used us like we were nothing but _trained dogs_. He held us back from our true potential because he was afraid of it. He was _weak_."

"Is that how the girl was able to kill him?" Zhin-Tok asked. It didn't surprise Kylo that they knew that story, since it was the only one he'd told to anyone, and Hux had sent it out en masse throughout the Order, along with a bounty for Rey's head. Kylo knew there was only one way he could be sure of the Knights' unbroken loyalty to him. They must be told the truth.

"No," he said, shaking his head faintly as he turned to face them again. "It's how_ I_ was able to kill him." All six pairs of eyes were upon him in varying degrees of shock and query.

"What?" Visser breathed.

Kylo took a deep breath to steady his thundering heart, hand hovering near his saber. They were supposed to be unarmed but he wasn't foolish enough to think they'd go anywhere without something literally up their sleeves.

"I killed Snoke."

There was a pause as the truth of his words sunk in. Kylo waited, tense, for any one of them to make a move, to accuse him of treason and call for his head or try to remove it themselves.

"That's high treason," Zhin-Tok quietly said, brow drawn down over his almond shaped eyes, but he didn't move to attack. Kylo watched as Tomaxx realized something, his red eyes meeting Kylo's with a glimmer of understanding.

"I know," murmured the Master solemnly, but there was a challenge in his stance and in the set of his jaw as his gaze swept across the Knights.

Torca ran a hand through her hair as she exchanged a look with Dyarron, then looked back at Kylo.

"How? And why?"

"What do you mean, '_why'_?" He spat. "He was _weak._ His mind had finally decayed with his body and he had become unworthy of his throne."

Kylo stepped closer, drawing their tense attention.

"He was satisfied using us for our power while never fully finishing our training." Kylo peered into their eyes as he enunciated, "_I am not satisfied._ We aren't dogs. We are Knights of Ren, and now that I am Supreme Leader we can become more. We can become like _gods_."

"How?" Visser reiterated, the mood of the room shifting from wariness to interest.

"I have full access to Snoke's Sith texts now." Kylo replied, and watched as the implications of what that meant reached their eyes. If they could learn the ways of the Sith on top of what they knew of the ways of Ren then maybe they could become as powerful as Snoke. _Or Darth Vader._

They could all become Sith lords, the Rule of Two be damned.

"What must we do, Master?" Torca asked, any uncertainty from before gone as she looked him in the face, eyes blazing with the prospect of such power at her fingertips.

Kylo straightened, squaring his shoulders. "When I brought us all to Snoke, we swore allegiance to him and to the Dark Side. Now you must swear yourselves to me. Not to the First Order, not to the Sith or the Ren, but to _me_. I will teach you things of the dark side that Snoke would have kept from you. I will fashion you into Knights more powerful than you have ever imagined. Together, the seven of us can make a new order and rule the galaxy."

Kylo's heart squeezed in such terrible longing as the words slipped from his lips. He wished more than anything that Rey was by his side in that moment as one by one the Knights knelt to their knees, eyes cast upwards at him in deference and awe. Rey would never look up at him in such a way, but he knew he didn't want that anymore. She was his equal, and should she come to him he would treat her as such. But still, he wished she was here, claiming the Knights' loyalty alongside him.

_No,_ he reminded himself bitterly. _She chose her side. She chose to reject this power. She will fight with the Resistance and she will lose with them._

There would be no mercy from him. Not anymore.

"Knights," he intoned, feeling the Force gather and hum around them as his words were saturated with dark power and meaning. "Do you swear an oath that you will render unconditional obedience to me, to exercise every power in service to my cause, and will, whensoever you are asked, be prepared, as loyal apprentices, to surrender your life for this oath?"

Their voices rang with the same dark power as they answered.

"I, Tomaxx Ren, do so swear."

"I, Cseenan Ren, do swear it."

"I, Torca Ren, do so swear."

Kylo sensed a slight hesitance before Zhin-Tok swore, and made a mental note to keep an eye on the Knight. Visser also had something whirling beneath his stoic surface, but when he swore the oath there was nothing but determination and acceptance.

Then, lastly, "I, Dyarron Ren, do so swear this oath."

Kylo's whole body felt warmed and electrified with each oath sworn. These were his comrades in arms, his Knights, and now his apprentices. The First Order could crumble around them, but he knew that with these six figures by his side there was nothing that could destroy him. He felt so powerful, so great in his accomplishment. Not even Darth Vader had managed to gain an apprentice, and here he, Kylo Ren, had _six_.

How had he ever doubted himself? This had been his destiny all along—his grandfather had shown it to him. His Force vision from touching hands with Rey had shown it to him, although she'd been at his side when he'd come into his power in that vision.

Perhaps that was yet to come. If he wiped out the Resistance she would have no choice but to come to him, as he'd be the only one left alive who still cared about her. With her at his side as well, nothing in the galaxy would stand in their way.

"Rise, Knights of Ren and Lords of the Sith." In one fluid motion they stood once more, faces alight with dark pride, determination, and pure fire of spirit.

Yes, they would do well under him._ Very well._

* * *

After getting their unofficial mission reports once the formalities of their oaths were finished, Kylo had the Knights meet him in the ship's training complex. Typically used by the stormtroopers, it was large enough to serve the 8,000 troops that were conscripted to the _Finalizer_, and usually had around 400 troops training on daily cycles. In addition to close combat and weapons drilling, there were flight simulators and ground vehicle instruction. And, of course, the reconditioning rooms.

There were smaller rooms for use of the officers as well, and Kylo had taken one for his personal use when he had first been assigned to the _Finalizer_. The mats had been stripped away to reveal the gleaming obsidian durasteel beneath, the hard floor a better deterrent to failure than the soft mats ever would have been. Snoke had taught him that only through pain would he find strength in the dark side of the force, and so anything deemed too easy on the body was removed from his life.

Kylo would not torture his Knights the way Snoke had, but he would not let them go soft either. Through pain and suffering they would grow stronger, gain more focus, and ultimately find freedom in the Force in ways that the Jedi Code had never allowed. Luke had relaxed some things in his temple, but the fact still remained that the Jedi were to expunge things such as passion and emotion, while the Sith Code celebrated them. The greatest power and strength Kylo had ever felt had been through the passion of his anger and the depth of his dark emotions, so there would be no meditating on peace or harmony under his tutelage.

The Knights met him suited up in-full—weapons and masks included. Kylo felt naked without his own worn helmet, even though he'd been training and fighting without it for almost a month now. It also didn't help that the Knights had noticed it's disappearance as well.

"No helmet today, Master?" Visser asked, his voice distorted by his garish black mask. Like all the others, there were silver lines that accented the visor, each line being a symbol of the strength of their power. Only Kylo's mask had had four such lines—the other Knights only had two or three.

"I destroyed it." Kylo said with a clipped tone as he moved to sit on a viewing bench on a raised platform to the side. The Knights exchanged hidden looks behind their dark masks before standing to attention before him.

Kylo looked at each of them, gathering his thoughts and steadying his mind. Today he would merely observe them in their drills, noting areas of weakness and strength to better form an efficient training plan.

Before he could tell them this, the door to the room slid open, and a very irate General Hux marched through it.

The Knights looked back at Kylo for orders, and with a silent wave of his hand he motioned for them to stand to the side.

Hux stopped near where the Knights had just vacated, the steely look on his face challenging in a way that set Kylo's temper on edge.

"_Supreme Leader_," He ground out with borderline disrespectful bite, "As head of the First Order you are no doubt aware of the standards that we fervently adhere to in regards to military personnel and staff."

Kylo leaned back in his seat, arms crossed. "I am, although your standards of productivity and efficiency are wholly deficient compared to mine."

The General's nostrils flared. "My apologies, Supreme Leader. I shall endeavor to correct that."

Kylo sneered. "See that you do."

"And for such correction to incur," Hux continued, drawing himself up further, "perhaps we should start with the _space trash_ that has descended upon my ship."

The air stilled in the room as silence pressed down on it. Kylo was watching the General with a look that may have appeared lazy if not for the small twitch below his left eye and the crackle of angry energy that swept outwards from his seated form.

"To what 'space trash'" he asked tensely, "on _my_ ship are you referring?"

The General glanced pointedly at the Knights standing at attention to his left where Cseenan stood, then remained silently fuming, stiff like a scorpion stuck between wanting to attack and wanting to flee.

Kylo knew exactly to whom among the dark guard he was referring, but preferred to watch the man squirm than give him any leeway. It was well known that Hux had strong prejudices toward non-humans, although racism was a trait that permeated the First Order as a whole.

"Knights." Kylo intoned, never looking away from Hux's glare. "Remove your masks so the General can better see you, and remember."

Without hesitation the Knights reached up to release their masks and pull their helmets from their heads. Their scarred visage was made even more menacing by their collective glares and sneers.

Hux's jaw clenched as he breathed in deeply. "Remember _what_, Leader Ren?"

The words were barely out of his mouth before he gave a yelp as his body was slammed to ground, his face hitting the gleaming obsidian with a loud smack. Before he could recover, his limbs jerked and strained as his body was taken over by the Force and he was positioned up to his knees, arms straight at his sides. Kylo stood, his fingers crooked as he poured his dark power into the despised General, knocking aside his usually steely mental defenses and filling his mind with agony.

The General didn't so much scream as he did give a long cry of pain through bloody, clenched teeth. Kylo continued for a moment longer, enjoying how the redhead was mentally writhing, then stopped. The cry ceased. Hux breathed heavily as blood oozed from his nose and lip, dripping from his chin, and his icy blue eyes spoke of murder. Even so, Kylo knew the only thing keeping the man from collapsing on the ground was his power holding his body hostage. He took a step down the platform, his anger like a pulse in his head.

"You will look at their faces, General, and remember that as of this moment they are my _Personal Council_, and as such," he bared his teeth, bent slightly at the waist, imbuing his words with power so that Hux felt their meaning down to his sniveling core. "_They now **outrank** you_."

Kylo turned his wrist, and Hux's straining body pivoted so he was facing the Knights directly.

"So look, General, and remember to show them the respect befitting their rank because _I will not remind you of this a second time._"

Kylo ripped his power away and Hux fell forward on weak arms, just barely managing to keep himself from face-planting again as his left elbow buckled. Blood speckled the floor as he coughed pathetically, but as he raised his head the heated contempt burned through his reddening face.

No one moved for a few long seconds, the air vibrating with hate, cruel enjoyment, and discomfort. Cseenan Ren's black eyes zeroed in on the bent man, a hunter to his prey. He stepped forward, his gait long and slow, tail twitching behind him. They all watched as he stopped a foot from the General, crouched, and silently stared the man down.

Hux's face trembled in his indignation, barely concealed disgust, and wariness. Quick as a flash Cseenan's arm struck out, grabbing a fistful of red hair and dragging him closer. To his credit the General did not cry out this time, nor grabbed the Knight's wrist the way Kylo felt he wanted to.

With his other clawed hand Cseenan pressed his thumb into Hux's chin, wiping the blood there as the man shuddered in outrage. It gave way to revulsion as Cseenan brought his thumb to his toothy mouth and languidly licked the blood from it with his long tongue. His eyes never left the man's, challenging him, letting him know who was the alpha here and who was the runt, his bloodlust whipping the force around him into a frenzy that energized the room and made every force-sensitive being there shift restlessly in anticipation of the prospect of carnage and death and pain.

Cseenan pulled Hux closer, razor sharp teeth just an inch from Hux's face.

"You taste like _shit_." He hissed, then threw the man back and stood, flicking away the red hairs stuck in his claws. "Now _get out_."

Hux glared up at the Barabel, unmoving. When his head turned to look at Kylo, the Master did not say anything for a moment, his irritation growing further as the crouching man still refused to move.

"You've been dismissed, General." Kylo ground out lowly, as if to a child, and they all watched as Hux shakily stood, smoothing his uniform out with jerky movements before turning and walking out of the room in a cloud of rage and humiliation.

When the door hissed shut behind him, the tenseness of the room dissipated.

"'Personal Council', Master?" Dyarron asked with a rough smirk.

Kylo remained serious as he looked between his Knights. "There is no one else I would trust for it."

Dyarron's smirk dropped as he solemnly nodded.

"Then as your _personal council_, my lord," Tomaxx said, red eyes seeking his out hesitantly, but knowingly, "I would advise you not to make enemies where you need allies the most."

Torca snorted. "Hux is a buffoon."

"Do no underestimate him, Torca." Tomaxx warned. "He did not get to his position on luck alone. With men like him there is always a trail of blood in his wake, even if he wasn't the one to spill it himself." Tomaxx turned back to Kylo. "Do not underestimate him, my Lord. And do not antagonize him more than necessary. A beaten dog is much more unpredictable than a tamed one."

"I will not allow him to insult us." Kylo snapped. "_Any_ of us. He will learn his place or he will perish under the weight of his damned pride and bigotry."

Cseenan looked at him with gleaming black eyes, his face unreadable even though Kylo could sense his emotions swirling within him. It wasn't just bloodlust and anger, but a strong mix of things that were what Kylo determined to be deep respect and unfathomable loyalty.

Kylo's chest tightened as he took all of it in. In that moment he knew Cseenan would die for him. And as he looked around at the grave faces of his apprentices, he could feel it from them as well. They would all fight and die for him, and Kylo knew this was what it meant to have a real family.

"Now that the interruption is gone, let's begin."

* * *

Red. All he saw was red. Blood, fire, anger, betrayal, fear. It was all pulsing red in his mind, in his vision, in his heart.

Fear and betrayal were what saved him as his uncle bore his green lightsaber down on him in his dark hut. Anger helped him pull the bricks and wood down upon them both, regardless if he killed himself in the process, just as long as Luke wasn't the one to take his life from him.

Wrath and sheer will of survival pulled his bleeding body from the wreckage, a cut on his scalp oozing blood down the side of his face, blinding his eye, and he felt pain in every pore of his body but he wouldn't let that pain paralyze him. _No,_ a voice told him, f_ocus on the pain, let it give you strength,_ and as he staggered to his feet he felt a darkness fill his body with power the likes of which he'd only had a taste of before.

The other students rushed out of their dwellings towards him, lightsabers ignited and he realized his own was still gripped in his bloody fist.

"_What happened?"_ Blaiv asked, eyes wide and heart pounding. "_Where's Master Skywalker_?"

"_He tried to murder me in my bed._" Ben rasped. He looked around. "_I acted in self-defense."_ Shocked silence, and then Yogg'slv shook his head.

"_You're lying_." He looked between the others. "_He's lying! You've been corrupted by the dark side, I can feel it. We've all felt it."_

"_What have you done?_" Hemley cried, a hand over her mouth as she stared at the rubble. "_Oh, Maker, what have you done?!_"

"_Shut up, Hemley_," Blaiv snapped. "_You know the old man has harbored resentment and fear towards Ben—towards his power." _

Lurrath's voice joined the shouting. "_It's dark power! He's been meddling with the dark side of the force, and now he's fully committed himself to it." _

"_And so what if I have?_" Ben challenged, eyes wild and blazing. _"Without the power of the dark side I would be dead right now by his hand!"_

"_You killed our Master!"_ Mish yelled, brandishing his saber.

Yogg'slv pointed at the bleeding boy, face full of fury and fear. _"You will pay for what you've done!"_

_"Luke tried to MURDER ME!"_ Ben screamed, and then his arms came up, and the lightsaber pierced Yogg'slv in the stomach, and the apprentice couldn't even cry out, could do nothing except to stare at Ben's red-rimmed eyes with a gasping mouth, his last breath leaving him as his body hit the ground.

Evin and Lurrath cried out, and then the world went from red to blue and green as lightsabers clashed and blood flowed and bones cracked and flesh burned.

The fight did not last long.

His vision wavering, Ben stood among the bodies and looked at those who had fought with him, saw the shock and bloodlust and fear in their eyes. And yet they looked to him for their next instruction.

_"Burn the temple."_ He rasped.

Tesarth nodded his scaly head silently, slipping into the darkness with Tomaxx and Rofitch in tow. Blaiv and Yu-Drax gathered the dead while Hemley looked on, face stony but for the pathetic tears running down her cheeks.

There was a presence still. A life yet to choose a side. He turned his red gaze to see Peoni standing outside her hut, frozen.

There was something different about her, something off from what he remembered, but it didn't matter. Nothing mattered but the blood and fire and hatred.

Her form wavered as he approached, her eyes wide with recognition and fear.

_"Will you join with us, or with them?"_

Her chest heaved as she shook her head, mouth tightly closed. Desperation and sadness poured from her. It made him sick.

_"Traitor."_ He spat, his heart filling with hatred and wrath and betrayal, his vision red with bloodlust and fire, and he roared his rage from the darkest part of his heart as he plunged his saber into her chest, up to the bloody hilt, but in that instant her murky form became sharp and vivid and it wasn't Peoni who was gripping his arms and it wasn't Peoni who looked at him with pain and terror as she screamed and all at once his vision cleared of the red and in it's place there was a shockwave of horror as he realized she was—

"REY!"

Kylo bolted up in bed, sweat glistening on the exposed planes of his chest where his black tunic had fallen open. He willed the lights on, looking around desperately for any sign of the girl he was connected with, but there was no sight of her. There was only her horror and fear and pain and the echo of her agonized scream in his head.

He latched onto the tail end of their connection, trying to push his way to her, into her mind, trying to see her and make sure she was alright, trying to make sure that he hadn't actually plunged his saber into her chest, that she hadn't seen the horrible things he had done that night when he'd burned down Luke's temple and burned what was left of his childhood innocence with it. But she was terrified, pulling from him as fast and as far as she could, slamming up her mental defenses so quickly and effectively that it was only a moment before he was completely blocked out, mind reeling in the sudden quiet and emptiness, and then the connection ended.

He shuddered at the sudden departure, panting heavily and still so desperate to make sure she was okay that he found himself attempting to enter his deepest meditative state. He searched blindly in the darkness of the Force for any sign of their connection, almost missing the hair-thin sliver of light. Slowly and with great care he pulled on the line, following it until he felt the bright edges of her mind. She was still closed off, but he could feel her turmoil and sickness at what she had experienced.

His realized his presence was likely to make her even more distraught, so with a final somber parting brush against her mind he retreated back to the shadows of his side.

He opened his eyes to find himself sitting on his messy bed. The sweat had mostly cooled and dried on his skin now but strands of his long dark hair still stuck to his neck and face. He stared blank-faced down at his hands in his lap, unable to see past the memory of all the blood and dirt and death that stained them.

It made sense that he should have that dream after being reunited with the Jedi students-turned Knights of Ren. He just wished Rey hadn't been sucked into it too.

His anger rose as he cursed the Force for connecting them at such a time. Why hadn't it connected them when he'd been standing tall above his oath-swearing Knights? When he had been in his most powerful moment, so that she could see what he was now, what he was becoming, and what she had thrown away?

With a shout Kylo swept out the force and threw his chair and everything on his desk across the room. Then, muscles trembling he got up and stiffly dressed, sending a summons for his Knights to meet him at the training room.

He drilled them hard, alternating fighting one against two and one against three until they were fighting just to stand, fighting just to have a moment to breathe, their heavy breaths audible even through their masks. Kylo himself had made sure to be in every match, thrilled to finally practice fighting against his brethren once more but also just desperate to expel the tumultuous energy raging within him. More than once one of the others had to step in to keep him from doing any grievous harm to whomever he had targeted. But there was no wariness or fear from them, only steadfast determination and dark will to eventually best their Master.

They broke for a meal after four hours, which was about when he felt the first wave of righteous anger filter across the bond from Rey. The strength of it surprised him, but what surprised him more was the fact that it continued to waver in the back of his mind for most of the day. He wondered what it was that had brought her ire so, and whether it was because of the dream or not. He'd sensed her anger before, of course, when she'd fought him on Starkiller, yelled at him across the bond, and fought beside him on the _Supremacy_. Her wrath was a beautiful and wild thing. It really had no place in someone trying to become a Jedi.

And Kylo found that somehow it complimented his own hateful feelings. Where his anger was dark and heavy like black magma, hers was bright and hot like a starburst. He used it to focus his mind when he and his Knights began meditation practice after their meal, although the headache that suddenly bloomed behind his eyes made it more difficult than usual.

It was after Kylo had dismissed them to get cleaned up and mind their own time for the rest of the day that the Force bond pulsed to life, and Rey's bright presence on his senses flared up.

He turned to look at her, suddenly struck by some achingly familiar scent that reminded him of summers spent on warm verandas as a steady hand showed him the traditional calligraphy of a people almost entirely extinct. He pushed the memories and nostalgia away, back into the dark corner of his mind where the dead boy he used to be was kept. It would not do to dwell on such things.

He passed his gaze over her, assessing her, subconsciously making sure she was physically fine even though he knew he could not actually hurt her in his dreams. She looked worn and weary, which he expected, but some blush of embarrassment warmed her side of the bond that peaked his curiosity.

Then she had to go and bring up the events of their last force connection and his outrage and feelings of betrayal were lit anew.

Their argument was heated but thankfully did not end in blows, although Rey had looked and felt several times like she was going to lash out at him. And several times he wished she would just hit him instead of sneer things at him such as "_there you go again, telling me I'm worthless without you,"_ and "_Aren't I 'Nothing'? Aren't I 'nobody'?"_ and he never wished to take back those words more than he did right then.

Her use of his own words against him tore open something in his chest that made him want to grab her and shake some sense into her, because of course he didn't think she was nobody, hadn't she heard him that day? Hadn't he told her how much she meant to him as they lay together both times? He was the only one in the galaxy who thought she was truly somebody, and somehow she'd twisted his meaning around into something malicious.

And then in her anger she made a mistake. She let it slip that she'd found out about the Knights.

The mere thought that she'd somehow used some moment of weakness in him, some instance of frayed mental duress, to spy on his activities awakened something in him that was murderous.

He tried to ignore her broken pleas of innocence when he accused her of espionage, but he could feel her sincerity through the bond and knew she was telling the truth. Which meant there were Resistance spies among the First Order, on his ship.

She tried defending the people she called friends, but he knew what type of group they were. He knew they would eventually put the needs of the Resistance over her own, and she'd be used up and thrown away like she was disposable, like she was replaceable. Why couldn't she see that? He had seen it for himself, had experienced it all his life, so why didn't she trust his word?

No matter. She'd learn of it the hard way eventually. She'd learn what kind of 'friends' she really had once they found out about the Force bond. No doubt they'd treat her like a compromised asset and have her locked away, although maybe by then she'd be more willing to come to his side.

The connection closed as he felt her conflicted heart, torn between wanting to deny his words and being unable to deny them. Her anger permeated the air of his rooms with the faint scent of her soaps and he quickly left for the bridge.

Someday she'd be by his side. He just needed to be patient.

* * *

Later that night Kylo sat at his desk in his quarters, reading over the Knights' official mission reports when he felt the Force brush over the room like a heavy blanket, drowning out the usual sounds until only silence and a second set of breaths could be heard.

He tensed, not moving except to casually close out the open report, not wanting to risk the possibility that Rey might see even just a few key words of what was written inside. The bond seemed to pick and choose when they were able to see the other's surroundings, so it seemed safer to err on the side of caution. She may have strived to convince him she wouldn't use their connection to spy on him for the Resistance, but he knew it was only a matter of time before she at least tried. Her rabble friends would probably demand it of her once they found out about the bond, and he knew in her efforts to keep in their good graces she wouldn't be able to refuse.

There was no avoiding each other when the Force willed their connection, so Kylo knew that eventually they would be forced together once more.

Rey would no doubt continue the argument they'd gotten into earlier.

He clenched his jaw, waiting for her to come up from behind him and start yelling. But after several heartbeats there was still only silence.

_Wait._

A small noise, like a breathy cry of pain filtered through the hush, and Kylo turned in his seat at the sound.

She was lying on the bed, blanket missing, and as she turned to curl up on her side she gave another small cry. Kylo was up out of his chair in the next instant.

As quietly as he could he padded to her side, observing with keen eyes her heaving breaths and trembling body. As he got closer he also saw her pained expression and the sweat beading on her skin, staining her rumpled clothes. She was having a nightmare.

Kylo wondered for a moment what it was she was seeing, and whether it involved him running her through with a lightsaber again. Perhaps if he'd been asleep he would be experiencing her fear too, but maybe there was another way he could see.

The stiff bed barely dipped as he slowly sat on the edge of the left side, right arm bracing his body as he leaned over her form, caging her, the other hand coming up to brush lightly against her temple.

Entering people's minds had become almost second nature to him, and for most people it was like pushing aside a thin curtain, or stepping into tall grass. Their mental defenses were nothing compared to the strength of his power and the might of his will. If he wanted to get into someone's mind, he would, and the painfulness of the encounter typically depended on their attempt at resisting him, or his mood. Usually he paid no heed to their discomfort, ripping through their thoughts like a mole clawing through the earth.

But not with Rey.

On Starkiller base when he'd told her he got no pleasure from invading her mind, he'd meant it. It was merely something that needed to be done, and he had truly meant to be as gentle as possible.

Now, however, he found himself wanting to use his ability to soothe her, but once again—as with the time they first connected and he'd attempted to influence her to bring Skywalker to him—he was met with an impenetrable wall of pure Force as he tried.

He could sense her fear and anguish, but he could not see or feel anything beneath the surface of that. It seemed that the Force connected their minds only when they were both asleep, but would not allow them access in wakefulness.

He sat up as she writhed, turning to her side to face him with another whimper. His eyes landed on the scar on her neck and he recalled the day she got it.

It hadn't been long after everything fell apart on the _Supremacy_ and then on Crait—perhaps a week. Even though most of the First Order fleet had all but been obliterated when the _Raddus_ had pulled the suicide move via lightspeed, there had been other ships near enough their location that they were able to regroup somewhat and begin tracking the_ Falcon._

It had been almost too little too late however, since once they got to Mirrin Prime the Resistance had already started resupplying. The rebels were on their way off planet when the First Order quickly staged an attack.

Kylo had planned to be on his shuttle and in the fight, but General Hux had implored him (even though Kylo knew it pained him to do so) not to put himself in a position where he could be killed.

_ "We are in a very delicate time, Leader Ren. Don't let your personal vendettas cause the First Order any more losses."_

Kylo should have slammed the man into the wall again for his veiled jab, but instead had decided to appeal to Hux and let the man do what he did best. Kylo could admit that the General was good at his job; if he wasn't he wouldn't have ended up leading the entire First Order army under Snoke. But his strategy on Mirrin Prime had almost caused Rey her life, and for that Kylo would never fully trust him again.

The searing pain he'd felt had actually only started after a blast of sudden fogginess hit his senses like someone had shot a silent sonic canon next to him. His ears rang, sounds of the _Finalizer_ bridge muffled, and for a moment he thought they were having a Force connection moment.

But then the pain started, and he'd had to clench his jaw to keep from crying out. His hand had flown to his neck, thinking for a moment that somehow he'd been cut by something or someone—perhaps Hux had come up behind him with a knife without his knowing. But his glove came away clean.

Fear and pain and confusion hit him next, and in that moment he knew Rey had been hurt very badly, especially once the searing pain started to recede and his limbs went numb with cold. His heart had started pounding in his chest as if he was the one losing so much blood the organ had to work double-time to keep things pumping. And then he felt her life-force, her light, bleeding away with her blood and he didn't know if the panic and desperation he felt was coming from him or from her, and he'd found himself lurching from his post by the large viewport, trying to get off the bridge and into some shuttle, _any shuttle_, so he could get down to Mirrin Prime and _save her, no, no, please, not her too, not her too_, but as he made his way down the ship the numbness started to ebb away, and with it he could feel warmth and life slowly sink back into her side of the bond.

He'd found an empty supply closet, leaned against the shelves and just breathed in the relief. _Someone had saved her._

And of course seeing her for the first time after that, he'd been consumed with the need to make sure she was actually alright before getting mad at her stupidity for getting hurt in the first place.

Didn't the Resistance know how important she was? Who the hell signed off on her being on the front lines? Once again Kylo seethed at the thought that the rebels didn't value her life the way they should, but he also knew she wasn't the type to stay in any place of safety if her 'friends' were in trouble.

Coming back to the present, Kylo slowly smoothed his fingers over the scar on her scalding neck. He settled his palm against her thumping pulse, thumb brushing gently over her jaw, and threaded his digits through the damp strands of her hair at the nape of her neck. The Force thrummed at the connecting skin, sending a wave of goosebumps up his arm and his eyes fluttered closed for a moment as he drank in the feeling. Her heaving chest settled down somewhat after that as well, although her face remained tense.

_I wonder if she'd wake up if I kissed her?_

The intrusive thought made him frown and lean back a little.

This wasn't a fairytale, where the Prince kissed the Princess and made all their demons go away. If anything his kiss would probably make things worse for her, if he remembered correctly her frightened look from the night he'd tried to kiss her, before being so rudely interrupted by a service droid. At that time he'd been overcome with the need to express the tight feeling in his chest from her soft words, and felt that pressing his lips to hers had been the only way that could convey it all, or at least make the tightness go away.

He would not be attempting that again, although the urge still remained. Why would she want to kiss a monster, a Jedi killer, the supreme ruler of her enemies? Their connection notwithstanding, they were on opposite sides of a war in more ways than one. They were playing with fire by pretending otherwise.

And yet, despite knowing she was once again technically his enemy now, seeing her like this Kylo couldn't help but try to push some small amount of comfort through their bond, hoping the feeling would reach her across the galaxy and bring her some peace.

Rey shifted again, rolling to her back, and as Kylo pulled his hand away her eyes fluttered open just as the connection closed.

Kylo sat on his bed, warm fist clenched, and felt the wholeness of their minute union disappear with her. Darkness rushed in to fill the void, and he buried his face in his hands, defeated.


	5. The Shadow Before You

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A chapter in which Rey struggles with some things, friendships are further developed, and the plot starts picking up.

* * *

Rey opened her eyes slowly just as a dark figure by her bed disappeared. She touched her neck, feeling where the skin was cold compared to the rest of her heated body and shivered. Had the figure been a lingering part of her dream? Or had it been…?

She shut her eyes, hand falling to her side. The last vestiges of the connection whispered around her, telling her that the figure at her bedside had most definitely been Ben. She wished he'd woken her up, both to escape the nightmare she'd fallen into and to have the chance to talk. Most likely it would have ended in another argument, but at least she would feel whole again for a little while.

How long had he been watching her as she slept? It was a little disconcerting. Granted, she had watched him sleep once, but this was the second time she'd woken up to the ghostly feel of him touching her and she didn't quite know what to make of it. Couldn't quite interpret the second shiver that ran through her at the thought.

What if she'd woken up just thirty seconds earlier? Would he have just sat there silently looking at her—touching the scar on her neck—until the connection ended, or would he have said something?

_Would he have tried to kiss me again?_

The sudden thought came out of nowhere, and she covered her face with her hands as another sort of heat turned her skin flushed. _What a ridiculous thing to think._ She banished the whole idea of how soft and warm his lips might be from her mind and returned her hands to her sides. That was something she could not want.

She sighed, deciding to try and get back to sleep in spite of the buzzing beneath her skin and the strange pulsing warmth throughout her body. But after a moment of lying uncomfortably in the mixture of warring emotions and sensations within her she wondered if she should take a quick shower to calm her nerves first.

Rey sighed again. She was just too tired to even get up and use the 'fresher.

All of the nighttime Force 'visits' and worrying about said Force visits, plus Ben's horrible nightmare she was pulled into the night before meant that sleep hadn't been something she was getting enough of lately. She'd had her fair share of sleepless nights on Jakku for sure, but imagining the island did not help lull her mind anymore now that her imaginings included the Dark Place, and what it had showed her. Now she just tried to keep her mind blank—to find some sort of mindless existence in the Force around her—and let that pull her into unconsciousness.

But behind her closed eyelids images of sand dunes shimmering in unbearable heat appeared and she quickly opened her eyes again. Her lungs burned with dreamy echoes of sucking in dry heat and dust as she yelled and screamed at the familiar shapes leaving her behind. She could still feel the unforgivable rays of the sun on her skin, the desperation for water, and the never ending pains of hunger that twisted her stomach and forced her to know the true meaning of starvation.

_It was a dream. I'm safe now, away from Jakku._ She thought like a mantra. _I'm not on Jakku anymore, I'm safe with the Resistance. I'm not on Jakku._

_I'm not on Jakku._

But still she felt a droning in her breast, a tightness that made it hard to breath and her heart to pound. Turning on the lights she swung her heavy legs over the side of her bed and went to her food box, opening it to check that yes, her stash was still there. Then she went to the 'fresher and turned on the tap. Yes, still water.

She held her hands beneath the cool stream, scooping up a mouthful and drinking it greedily. She'd never get tired of how amazing it felt to drink cold water. Or have food she didn't have to scavenge junk for.

Still, though, she didn't like feeling she wasn't earning her keep aboard the_ Amilyn_—she wasn't used to getting things just because she was there. She needed to do more to help on the ship, train harder, _something_. She didn't like feeling useless.

Rey turned off the tap after drinking her fill and, wiping her hands on her pants, looked forlornly at the two halves of Luke's lightsaber sitting unfixed on her small desk. Perhaps she should start with that, since a Jedi wasn't a Jedi without a lightsaber. The problem was she had no idea where to even begin with repairing it, and every time she tried to sit down and get started on it her brain would just draw up a blank.

And for someone who could fix just about anything mechanical, it was a very foreign feeling not knowing how to even start with the saber. She'd gathered some parts that looked like they could work and had attempted to put some pieces back together, but it was all a shot in the dark. She had no idea what she was doing.

Rey sighed, turned from the broken saber and crawled back into bed as the lights turned out. She'd look on the holos again tomorrow for anything on lightsabers. There had to be something or someone out there in the galaxy who knew about them.

_You know exactly who could help you,_ A treacherous voice whispered in her mind.

Rey shut her eyes against the thought. Kylo would sooner take the saber from her than help her fix it. This was something she would just have to figure out alone.

* * *

When she finally woke up again (at a more reasonable time) Rey felt the need to avoid everyone, choosing to stay in her quarters to decipher the Jedi texts and meditate instead of seek out her friends. Usually she'd also go to the extra storage room to train with her staff or a broken piece of pipe in place of the saber, but today she just really didn't feel like seeing anyone, even in the corridors.

She shut the blind on her viewport and lowered the lights to a dim glow, settling herself into a seated position in the middle of the floor. She needed to meditate today, to feel the Force as it flowed around and inside her, to be wrapped in it's light and warmth. After her dream of heat and sand and burning sun she'd felt rather cold, the feeling reminiscent of how cold she'd felt for the first few weeks away from Jakku until her body had acclimated to the new climate aboard the ships.

It was nothing like the freezing bite of Starkiller base, but it was a chill she still couldn't quite shake, even after putting on more layers.

Rey straightened her back, hands placed on her knees, and closed her eyes. She'd read in one Jedi text about the proper way to breathe when meditating, and how controlling one's core was the only way to control one's mind. She tried it out, breathing in deeply through her nose, feeling the air fill her lungs deep into her diaphragm, holding it for two seconds, and then letting it out slowly through her parted lips. Hopefully this method of breathing would actually help.

But even so, it wasn't easy today to fall into a meditative state. She kept seeing her friends' rattled expressions behind her closed eyes. She felt bad about her angry outburst at them from the day before, and even more rotten about making them look so uneasy by nearly losing control of her powers. She didn't want them to be frightened of her. She didn't want them to think she was a freak.

But at the same time, in spite of the darkness that still threatened Ben's heart—and in spite of how much of an asshole he'd been yesterday (although she hadn't been very nice either)—she still believed the tiny amount of light within him was worth fighting for. Even if that meant fighting against her friends.

If only there was some way she could prove it to them. Some way to convince them he was worth fighting for, and that his turning would help end the war. Maybe someday there would be a chance to bring him into the light, although now that he had his Knights she had a feeling that day was getting farther and farther away.

She would just have to try harder to talk to him during their Force connections—try to convince him to join the light side and abandon the dark side. Nothing good came from the dark side anyways; it didn't even feel right. Her brief brushes with it in the Dark Place on the island had left her feeling slightly sick and weak afterwards. How could Ben stand it all the time?

Rey shivered, and tried to clear her mind of anymore murky thoughts. She began to imagine a blank wall or an empty room as a starting point. Eventually it manifested in her mind, and she felt herself begin to drift in a sea of grey broken up by white fog. It was beautiful and peaceful here in this place of nothing and yet everything.

She spread out her senses as if spreading her hands through sand. If she focused, she could sense every living creature on the ship, feel the Force move with them as they went about their duties. There was Poe, Rose, Finn, and Chewie, each with their own special signature even if they didn't know it. She could also feel Leia's light like a beacon in the Force, not particularly powerful, but steady and unwavering in it's goodness.

When Rey had been on Ahch-To she had been able to feel the whole island and all of it's dichotomies: light and dark, life and death, peace and violence. She hadn't extended beyond that because the Dark Place had called to her, drawing her in, whispering in her mind and enticing her with truths that cut to the bone. But now Rey pushed outward still, further into the empty space that seemed a vacuum but was teeming with the life and energy of the Force.

There was no hard separation of light and dark out there. There was just the Force, pulsing and echoing with undulating waves of lights and darks and greys and everything in between. It was becoming more difficult to push her senses out now, but try she did until she brushed against the pulsing energy of a distant planet.

She wanted to get closer, to feel the life of whatever lived on the world. But her efforts were already at their max, her concentration pulled taught like a string, like a glowing string…stretching out from her into the void…

_What is that?_

She snapped back into herself with enough shocking immediacy that it was actually a bit painful. She gasped for breath, gulping down big draughts of air as if she'd been held underwater for almost too long. She blinked, the dim light so bright to her eyes that had been closed for…

She looked at the chrono on the wall.

"Three hours?!"

No wonder her body was so stiff and sore. She'd never sat in one place like that for so long before.

Her heart pounded solidly in her chest as she remembered what it was that had jolted her from the meditation. The bright string, extending from her form towards something. She knew there was something at the end, and decided that in spite of her aching body she was going to see what it led to.

She stretched a little bit before settling back into her meditation pose, finding that falling back into the peace and liveliness of the Force was much easier and more quickly done than the first time. She reached out with her senses, searching for the string, trying not to become impatient or desperate and lose her concentration.

It took a short while, or maybe a long while—she couldn't tell, but she finally came upon it again. It was so thin, she'd almost not seen it. But now that she could she wondered how she almost managed to miss it at all. The curious thing seemed to give off a light glow, and yet she could sense small sparks of dark flare off every now and again. She mentally grasped it, almost feeling it as if it were solid. It seemed so fragile, and yet as she gave it a small tug, she could feel it's strength. This was not a string that could be easily cut.

Her curiosity clawed at her mind, and she began to follow it. It was slow-going, and it seemed to go on forever, but finally she began to sense something. She was approaching something—something solid.

She couldn't see it, couldn't see or sense anything anymore except darkness all around her, almost suffocating in it's intensity. The string was a dark line in her grasp now, but Rey could sense that it pulsed a dim light, like a body just near the end of life—or a candle burned down to the smallest flame, refusing to go out.

She brushed her senses against the wall before her, feeling something very familiar about it—something that made her feel whole and balanced—and it gave a small jolt, as if she'd surprised it.

She'd never known a wall to be surprised before. Curious if it would react again, she brushed against it once more, but this time it became like the hardest durasteel against her senses.

She pulled back from it, slightly incensed, and sent the smallest pulses towards it, just barely getting a grasp of it but still curious nonetheless.

After a small while of this she could sense the wall softening, the hard durasteel turning into more of what she'd describe as the feeling of dark magma—more pliable and giving, but still able harden at the smallest provocation.

Something pushed out from the wall of magma, reaching towards her hesitantly. There was no fear in her as she reached back, somehow knowing this thing couldn't hurt her. Not here.

The dark formless thing wrapped around her just as she wrapped around it, her innocent pulses of curiosity causing whatever it was to become amused.

A voice rumbled around her, through her, into her mind, as if it was her own, as if it came from her but she knew it wasn't her voice:

_'What are you doing, Rey?'_

She knew whose voice it was.

_'Ben?'_

Her shock wrenched her from him as she once again snapped back into her physical body. Ben's presence in her mind disappeared, and even as she searched pitifully around her for him as she gasped for air, she knew he was not here.

She'd bridged their connection _without the Force doing it for them_, although it had only been their minds. What did this mean? Could they connect on their own this way? It took an incredible amount of energy (and time, she thought as she peeked at the chrono again and saw another two hours had lapsed), but apparently it was possible.

She wasn't sure she wanted it to be possible, but then again, maybe this could be the way to bring him to the light. If she could be a more consistent voice of good in his head maybe she could make a difference.

There was also a bloom of warmth in her chest at the thought of being able to have more contact with the man, and she allowed herself to enjoy the feeling for a moment. They'd managed to have a couple moments of connection and understanding between them since they started talking through the Force, in spite of their knack for getting into verbal spats. She really just wanted to have one normal conversation with him though. She wanted to know about him— the real him—not the dark mask of Kylo he always wore (but not so much around her anymore, she reminded herself).

She also wanted to know the full story behind his fall to the darkness. And she wanted to know about the good things that he'd held onto before Luke had pushed him over the edge.

She'd just have to wait and see how things went the next time the Force connected them.

Stretching out her legs was agony, and Rey couldn't help the groans of pain that escaped her as she unfolded from her sitting position. _Maker_ did her body hurt. If she was going to do this again she needed to figure out a more comfortable position, or try to find him faster. As it were, she was mentally exhausted and couldn't imagine even trying to spread her senses out so much again so soon.

Gingerly, Rey rose on shaky legs to lay herself down on her bed, marveling at it's softness compared to the floor. Just a quick rest while her body recuperated, and she'd go back to studying the texts.

* * *

Rey woke blearily from her nap and sat up. She felt like she'd had her brain taken out, kicked around in the sand by Unkar Plutt's lackey's, and then had it roughly shoved back into her head. Even her body felt achey and frail.

_Wasn't meditation supposed to strengthen a person?_ She thought glumly as she rose shakily to get a drink of water and, still not wanting to confront the ships occupants, retrieve one of the only Jedi texts she found she could understand to bide the time.

Or, at least, sort-of understand. She'd barely managed to make it a couple pages in so far. The language it was written in was Galactic Basic, but sometimes it felt like the words were indecipherable even as she recognized them. It had made for a very slow reading process.

Rey's eyes followed her fingers as they slowly slid beneath each word, her mouth sounding them out silently as she read them.

_'…The Jedi Code is the focus of all Jedi, and is the philosophy upon which stands the Jedi Order and religion. It is an encapsulation of one's relationship with the Force. As a Jedi, one must be faithful to the spirit of the Code, memorize it, and most importantly, understand it: There is no emotion, there is peace. There is no ignorance, there is knowledge. There is no chaos, there is harmony. There is no passion, there is serenity. There is no death, there is the Force.'_

But what did it all mean? How could there be no emotion, no chaos, no death? Wasn't that the point of balance? She wondered if Ben had to learn all of this, and a small voice whispered that she should ask him about it next time they speak, before she silenced it with a shake of her head. There was no way he'd be willing to help her with the texts, and she wasn't sure she wanted him to know she had them anyways. He'd likely try to find her just to destroy them.

Rey replaced her fingers at the beginning of the sentence she'd just read and tried to actually internalize the words this time. However, once again she found her thoughts straying from the task at hand and towards Ben, and Kylo Ren. Questions filled her mind until she had too many of them and not enough answers.

She wondered what sort of people his Knights were. Why had they chosen to follow him to the dark side? Do they care about him, or are they just mindlessly following him out of some sort of twisted sense of loyalty? Were any of them more loyal to Snoke than to Kylo? Had Ben even told them that he'd been the one to kill his Master? Would any of them have killed the deformed monster the way Ben had?

_I guess they'd have to have a reason to kill Snoke,_ she thought.

She still wasn't exactly sure about Ben's motivations that day in the throne room. Especially now that he'd decided to take over the First Order. She wondered if he'd done it for her, or for the power.

He had said he would do it all over again that night they'd woken up together for the first time. But whether or not he'd been thinking about preserving his new role or saving her life was the question. She wanted to believe some part of him cared about her— wanted to believe his vulnerable expressions, soft words, and gentle touches meant that he had some ounce of compassion left in him for her. She knew he wanted her to be by his side, but to what capacity she wasn't sure.

Had she made the right decision when she rejected his offer? If she had taken his hand and accepted the place by his side as dual leaders of a 'new order', could she have swayed him to the light side much more quickly?

She shook her head.

_No, I went with the Resistance because it was the right thing to do. It was the only thing to do. Just as I'm learning to be a Jedi because the Light side is good—I want to do good for the galaxy._

And hiding from her friends was not something a good person would do.

The better thing to do would be to go and apologize to them, but apologizing felt like giving up her belief in Ben Solo, and she didn't want to give that up. Eventually they'd come to understand that.

They _had_ to.

Rey sighed, closing the text, defeated once again by her inattentiveness. Her stomach growled loudly, the emptiness of it both familiar and foreign. The tightness in her chest returned.

Perhaps she could remedy things by breaking bread with them, so to speak. It was nearing dinner time anyways, and she'd already missed both breakfast and lunch while plunged in her meditation.

Her stomach twisted in on itself, complaining about it's hollowness. Her hands began to shake and she glanced at her stash box.

Yes, food was a great idea.

* * *

Rey wandered the ship, looking for any one of the people she knew. There were a few smiling nods sent her way as she passed by people busying about, which helped bolster her confidence and reminded her that even though the command personnel and her friends knew what she'd done on the _Supremacy_, no one else on the ship did. They still saw her as the one who'd helped save the Resistance on Crait. The one training to be a Jedi.

_I hope I don't let anyone down,_ She thought, turning another corner.

Poe and Finn were typically seen chatting and working together with Rose not far away, but after checking their usual haunts Rey decided they were apparently not to be found. Just when she was about to go search the mess hall she felt something turn her down another corridor towards the hangar instead.

As she entered the hangar she immediately noticed that they were traveling at hyperspeed, and realized she must have been meditating more deeply than she thought if she hadn't felt the jump. She wondered briefly where it was they were heading now, when her ears picked up the distinctive sound of Chewie yelling—his ire directed at someone who had apparently almost scratched the duralloy hull they were working next to.

Rose's voice replied, "Listen big guy, if you want these pitot tubes to be replaced there's gonna be some scuffs, because these things are not coming off the nice way."

More whining from Chewie, his hairy fist shaking up at where Rey could now see Rose harnessed to the side of the _Falcon_.

The young Haysian woman had her hands up in defense. "Okay okay! I promise I won't damage anything I don't intend to fix later. But trust me, dude, this baby'll run like a dream when I'm done with her."

The Wookie put his hands on his hips and growled.

Rose gave a small laugh as she lowered her visor and aimed her ionwelder at the pitot tube. "You're right, it already does, but I can make it eeeeven better."

Another crew member's head popped out from above the cockpit dome as Rose was illuminated by bright, snapping sparks.

He raised his voice to be heard over the whine of the machinery. "Hey, Rose, I'm gonna need to borrow the ionwelder from you when you're done. This one's giving me a hard time too."

"Got it!"

The young man stood, hands on hips as he frowned down at the pitot tube Rey couldn't see. He pushed up the sleeves of his jumpsuit and knelt down with a determined face. As Rey approached the _Falcon_, Chewie noticed her and padded over with warm eyes.

"Hey Chewie." She greeted with a smile, which turned into a laugh as he enveloped her in a hairy embrace.

He whined above her head, the questioning growl vibrating the chest beneath her cheek.

She sighed, separating from him. "I'm fine. Just been meditating a lot today. I've been feeling a little off."

He tilted his head, another queried whine in his throat.

Rey shrugged, looking away. "I dunno. Just…something's off."

Just then from atop the _Falcon_ there came a loud CLANG, and they both looked up to see the crewman jerk back from the force of his efforts to pull the pitot from the hull. His foot must have caught on something as he went to step back because suddenly he was too close to the edge of the ship, and then he was pitching backwards, arms pinwheeling to try and keep his balance, and then with a cry of terror he was falling, plunging forty feet towards the hard durasteel floor.

Rey wasn't sure if it was a conscious thought or just a reflex of the fear inside her that had her arm stretched out with the Force, feeling the weight of the man become nothing as she wrapped her power around his body and stopped him mid-air. The crew working in the area who had become alert at his shout looked at the man with incredulity, and then Rose gasped, "Rey!" and all heads turned to her.

Poe came out from beneath his new X-wing, eyes wide and mouth hanging open. He'd seen her lift the stones on Crait and a few times he'd interrupted her as she practiced lifting small objects in the storage room, but he'd never quite gotten used to the fact she had Force powers. None of them really seemed to have grasped it yet—especially the new recruits from Mirrin Prime.

Maybe they'd finally get it now.

As Rey tried to gently lower the man to the ground her grip on him slipped and he fell the rest of four feet to the floor. Several crew members rushed to check on him as he lay stunned on his back.

Rose belayed down and quickly unclipped herself to also check on the fallen crew member while Poe came up and touched Rey's shoulder.

"You okay?" He asked, noticing how suddenly out of breath she was.

She nodded, once again slightly overwhelmed that someone was asking her that question even though it wasn't the first, second, or even tenth time.

"Yeah. I'm sorry my control slipped."

Poe gave an incredulous huff of a laugh. "Rey, you probably just saved his life. A little fall like that is nothing."

BB-8 beeped his agreement from where he'd rolled to a stop at their feet.

Rey closed her eyes for a moment, wanting her apology to mean more than what happened today, but before she could explain she was suddenly surrounded by a small crowd of astonished crew members.

"How did you do that?" One of them asked.

Poe scoffed at the man. "What do you mean 'how did she do that'? How many times do I have to tell you people? She's a Jedi. She's got Jedi powers." He looked to her in confirmation.

"Well, actually," Rey started, remembering her own mistaken understanding of the Force before Luke set her straight. "They're not 'Jedi powers', it's the Force—"

"So the Jedi really are coming back." Another interrupted, face alight with hope and awe.

Rey felt the heavy gazes of everyone around her and tried to stand a little straighter, drawing on their collective hope and expectations to help her put as much confidence into her expression and voice as she could.

"Yes. I'm going to do everything in my power to bring the Jedi back. The First Order won't know what hit them when I'm done training."

Excited smiles and optimistic smirks passed between the group as they murmured to each other, shooting Rey bright glances, which she tried to return with a confident grin.

Then the crowd parted as the fallen crewman, flanked by two others helping him, limped up to Rey, his face white as a sheet but more amazed at her than afraid.

"Are you alright?" She asked, looking him over. He nodded.

"Yeah, thanks to you."

Rey frowned. "Just be more careful."

Poe leaned over, face serious. "There's a reason we have safety harnesses. Use one next time."

The man nodded quickly, murmured a "Yes, captain," then was led away on shaky knees to the medbay to be fully checked out.

As they crowd thinned out and people got back to work, Rose sidled up next to Rey and Poe, watching as the man disappeared around a corner. Her face when she turned to look at Rey was one of relief. She puffed out a sigh, eyes wide.

"Phew! That could have been bad. Good thing you were here, Rey, or we'd be calling for a cleaner bot to scrub blood and brains from the floor."

Rey opened her mouth to reply but was cut off as Finn ran into the hangar.

"Rose!"

He ran up to the short woman, hands gripping her shoulders as he searched her worriedly with his eyes.

"Are you okay? I heard someone fell from the Falcon and I know you were going to work on it today." He noticed Rey and his face softened from worry to acknowledgement. "Oh, hey Rey."

"Hey." She said, exchanging an amused glance with Poe.

Rose gave a strange half-smile, a blush painting her cheeks pink.

"Finn, I'm fine. It wasn't me that fell, it was Grent. And Rey actually saved him. She used her Jedi powers and stopped him _midair_. I've never seen anything like it. It was crazy!"

The young man looked back at Rey and smiled. "Really? That's so cool. You're getting pretty good at making things float now, huh?"

Rey shrugged. If making things float was the only thing she needed to learn in order to be a Jedi, she was almost there. But it wasn't enough, and she still didn't even have a complete grasp on it apparently.

Finn crossed his arms. "By the way, where you been today? I knocked on your door but no one answered, so I figured you were in your training room, but you weren't."

Rey frowned. He'd knocked? "Oh. Well…I was meditating so I might have been too out of it to hear you knocking. Sorry."

"Oh." And this time it was the others who exchanged glances.

"By the way," Rey said hesitantly, her stomach twisting in her abdomen. "Do you guys want to go grab some food?"

* * *

Rey looked between the two different offerings of meats and felt herself at an impasse.

Rose slid up beside her in line at the mess hall, her tray already full, and Rey turned to her with indecision.

"I don't know which to get. I've never had either of these before so I don't know what's good." Although it could taste like teedo dung and she'd still eat it. Food was food after all. Still, she hadn't felt comfortable taking more than her fair share of the food since they'd been established on the _Amilyn_, and so she knew she'd only be able to pick one. But which one?

It felt so silly to be asking herself that, when just two months ago she'd have chosen either one of them in a heartbeat just to take advantage of the fact something so high-quality was being offered. For _free_.

Rose merely shrugged. "Why not both?"

Rey's eye's widened, searching Rose's face for any sign that she was joking.

"Really? I can do that?"

"Yeah, sure, why not? Here." Rose put a healthy portion of each on her tray, beaming up at Rey's joyful expression.

"You know, I don't think I've ever had this much variety of food in my whole life." Rey confessed.

Rose gave another happy shrug. "Yeah, it was a shock to us too when we first joined."

Before Rey could say anything a loud voice accosted them from across the food station.

"Hey, what do you think you're doing?" The voice came from a scowling food service worker, who had his large hands where his hips probably used to be before his stomach had grown around to encompass them. His greasy face was stony, and Rey felt her heart stop in her chest.

She was at once reminded of all the times Unkar Plutt had leered at her as he swindled her for portions. It wasn't the first time the _Amilyn'_s large cook had brought up memories of the lecherous junk trader, but Rey had always tried to bury them away since the man hadn't ever seemed particularly unkind. Just looked like Unkar.

But now she wasn't so sure.

Several frenzied thoughts went through her head.

Had Rose unknowingly lied? Would they take her food from her? Kick her out of the mess hall? She supposed if that happened she could just eat from her food stash, but then what? Her stash was barely half of what she had on her tray. She calculated how much she could still save if she portioned it correctly. Maybe it would last her four days, five days tops if she laid off physical training and focused more on meditating to preserve energy—

"Oh, come on, Jerung." Rose teased with a smile. "You and I both know that this is the second time you've reheated this stuff, and you'll have to toss it out after today. Let the woman get some grub! Besides," She leaned forward conspiratorially, "your cooking is the best in the galaxy, and this poor woman has yet to experience the amazing flavors of your famous seared Gamorrean pork or your salted Bantha steak."

Jerung looked with narrowed eyes between the two women, more than a few tense moments passing, and then his face cracked into a huge grin. It would almost be endearing if he wasn't missing so many teeth.

"Bah! Alright, alright. Go on ahead, girly. I was just joshing with ya anyways."

Rey sagged in relief, her heart pounding in her chest.

"Thanks!" Rose said with an equally jolly smile.

"Oh, and Rose," he said, leaning forward and pointing at the woman with a glint in his eye. "Flattery will get you everywhere."

Both women laughed, Rey more out of sudden release of nerves than humor, and they grabbed their trays and headed over to where the boys had already sat and started eating.

"Are they really going to throw all of that out if it's not eaten?" Rey asked as they walked.

Rose shrugged. "Probably not. Jerung'll put it into a soup or something. Save's rations, and from what I hear we are seriously getting low on supplies."

Rey nodded, already mentally planning for the eventuality of no food.

"Do you guys know where it is that we're headed?" She asked the table as they sat.

"Hanna City, on Chandrila." Poe said around a bite. "To get supplies. Also," Poe leaned forward, prompting the table's occupants to lean forward too. "There's a secret memorial planned for the Hosnian system and the Galactic senators who were killed. General Organa wants to attend it, even though I think it's a trap." He scowled, the bitter tone in his voice betraying arguments he had and obviously lost about the plan to go to the memorial.

"It's definitely a trap." Finn agreed. "If I know the First Order, they're probably waiting for us to arrive and go planet-side before attacking the fleet and then picking us off with their turbo canons when we're stranded on the ground."

"Like they tried on D'Qar?" Rose asked.

Finn nodded. "Exactly." Then he grumbled, "It's insane that we're even going anywhere near the Inner Rim. By this time the Core will probably be infested with First Order ships."

"What sort of place is Chandrila?" Rey asked after swallowing a large mouthful of what was by far the tastiest thing she'd ever put in her mouth. "I mean, I know a little about it from holos. Isn't it an important planet? Do you really think the First Order would destroy it?"

"It's what they do, Rey." Finn said lowly, brows creased. "They destroy things in the name of order and stability."

"But what's the point of ruling the galaxy and making it into some bastion of greatness if they're just going to destroy the most developed parts?"

Finn shrugged. "They're not important to the First Order if they don't fall in line."

Chewie lumbered over and sat down, his tray full of meat and not much else. Rey looked at his tray in envy, and with an amused huff Chewie transferred an extra morsel onto Rey's. She took it and popped it into her mouth before he could take it back, sending him a thankful smile.

"And even if they did fall in line," Finn continued, "they'd probably blow them up just for fun, like they did Rose's home-world."

Rose nodded. "I wouldn't put it past them, even if Chandrila is a Core world."

Rey frowned above her tray, talking even as she shoveled more food into her mouth. "If it's so dangerous to go to Chandrila, why are we risking it?"

Poe set his cup down after taking a drink. "Apparently there's going to be a lot of our allies at this secret memorial. The general wants to try and use her presence to guilt them for aid, since they haven't returned our comms."

"Will it work?" Rose asked.

"The general can be very convincing when she wants to be."

Chewie gave a couple whiny growls, his chuckles like throaty barks. Rey, Poe, and Rose nodded and laughed. Finn's eyes narrowed, his mouth quirking up on one side.

"I think I'm starting to understand him. He said something about her being more stubborn than other people are patient, right?"

"Basically, yes." Rey said, giving him an appreciative nod. "I'm glad you've been studying."

"Kindof hard not to when he's yelling at me all the time."

"Speaking of studying," Poe said, turning to Rey. "How goes it? Any closer to figuring out how to defeat the galaxy's most evil team of Dark Lords and their Supreme Leader?"

Rey tensed up, her smile losing it's mirth. "Studying is going as well as it can without my having a proper teacher. I'd feel much better if I had the lightsaber fixed so I could at least train with it instead of my staff or the pipe I found. But I suppose I'm just going to have to do the best that I can with what I have."

"It's all we can do, Rey." Rose shrugged, sighing. "Our best with what we have." And then she swiftly changed the subject, much to Rey's relief.

"So did you guys feel that weird tremor earlier?"

Finn put down the veg he was about to eat. "Yeah, I did. What was that? I thought it was something wrong with the engines."

Rose shrugged. "They're working fine as far as I'm aware…"

Suddenly the noise around Rey took on a dreamlike quality as she felt the Force waver and lurch around her violently. She put her fork down, trying to school her features so no one at the table would take too much notice of the fact that the blood had drained from her face and her heart had sped up.

She hoped it was some hallucination brought on by lack of sleep and food, but the feeling of the Force bond jolting to life was unmistakable.

They'd never had a Force connection while she was around so many people before. Would Ben be able to see them? Hear them? Luckily they didn't seem to be talking about anything so case-sensitive anymore, but what if they said something important and it slipped through the connection?

All of her worried thoughts became moot when Kylo Ren shimmered into view like a heat mirage, right in the middle of the mess hall.

His back was to her, but she could still tell he was breathing hard from exertion, his hair damp with sweat. He turned, and in his hands he held his red lightsaber, the beam crackling and sizzling. The glow reflected in his burning eyes, wild with adrenaline and recognition and something incredibly dark as his gaze found hers. He looked so much like he had the day they'd fought Snoke's guards, and Rey found her pulse jumping for another reason as she remembered the way he'd looked at her then, his dark eyes burning into her, longing for something she hadn't been willing to interpret just yet because her friends had still been in danger and they took priority.

He was massive even without his cape, Rey realized. He took up space, not just with his size but also with his aura, his dark power. He was dressed neck to toe, but she remembered what he looked like shirtless, remembered beneath his pale, scarred skin the sinewy muscle and flesh hardened by years of training and discipline. If he'd actually been there on the Resistance ship, even surrounded by eighty crewmen eating in the mess hall, he could have slaughtered every one of them by himself. Of this Rey had no doubt.

His eye twitched as he scorched Rey with his gaze, but between one heartbeat and the next his head swung around to see something she couldn't, his body sinking back into the defensive pose he'd been in before he'd noticed her, and then he was swinging at something coming towards him and Rey could sense something, some extra indentation on the Force that was dark, and she knew he was training with his Knights, and as his lightsaber swung through two crewmen unaware of who they were walking besides Rey lurched to her feet, startling her table mates.

Finn blinked, looking up at her. "Rey? You okay?"

"I feel sick." She mumbled, stepping out from the bench seat and heading for the exit on quick feet, ignoring the concern of her friends behind her. She just needed to get out of there.

If she could sense the Knights, maybe they could sense her, and that was something she had a feeling would be disastrous if exposed prematurely. She hated to admit it, but Ben was probably right about her friends likely turning very cold towards her if they ever found out about her connection to him. Her friendships with them would be shaken for sure, and they'd probably lose a lot of trust in her.

But the Knights would probably try to kill Ben if they were to find out.

As she hurried down the corridor away from the mess hall, she tried to mentally separate herself from the connection, hoping that maybe that would help end it. It was an unpleasant feeling trying to pull from the Force and the connection it hosted, but just as she reached her quarters she could feel the bond close and she breathed a sigh of relief—even though she felt the loss immediately.

This was becoming _very_ inconvenient.

Rey slipped into her room and sat on her bed, feeling exhaustion weigh on her again. Her stomach simpered in her abdomen and she took a moment to mourn the loss of her meal. She'd be fine though. She had her food stash to tide her over until breakfast.

She breathed deeply, trying to settle her heart. In all of the recent Force connections Ben had either been asleep or relatively calm and non-threatening. Yesterday's heated argument had been unfortunate, but compared to how angry she's seen him before, yesterday was quite tame.

Seeing him in the mess hall in his warrior mode reminded Rey that he was an incredibly dangerous person—that he was Kylo Ren even if she knew Ben Solo still lived within him.

He had been such a terrifying figure on Takodana, coming at her in spite of her blasterfire, swinging his red saber and deflecting her shots as if swatting away some annoyance and not something that had killed a stormtrooper just minutes prior. And wearing those all-black, flowing robes—a faceless monster beneath a cold mask—he'd been like Death incarnate.

But somewhere between him taking off his mask for the first time and her almost killing him on Starkiller Base she'd stopped being afraid of him. It could have been when she'd turned his power against him and stolen into his mind, seeing things about him that struck her own memories and feelings, realizing he had a very human fear of his own—fear of not being good enough. Or it could have been when he'd killed Han Solo, and her fear of him had been replaced with hate and want for vengeance.

She'd experienced fear again while dueling him, but it was less of a fear of the boogeyman Kylo Ren and more of a real fear—a fear for survival against a man who by all accounts should have beaten her that day. But she had been the victor, and her fear of him had almost completely disappeared.

How scary could he be, really, if she could beat him?

But now she could recall with clarity why he was someone to be regarded with utmost caution. He'd frozen her body so easily on Takodana, and penetrated her mind like dipping his hand into water. He'd Force-thrown her into a tree, and almost killed Finn. In Snoke's throne room he'd fought three Praetorian guards by himself while she'd been trying to handle just one. He was the Master of the Knights of Ren—a title that probably had not been given lightly.

She thought once more, _Would he ever try to hurt me through the bond?_

Her thoughts were interrupted by a knock on her door.

"Rey? You alright?" It was Poe. Rey sighed, pressing the heels of her hands into her eyes as she mentally debated about pretending to be asleep, or just not there.

"Hey, so, I brought your meal. I figured since you didn't eat—" She was up opening the door before he could finish, startling him.

"Oh, hey." He said casually, blinking, and then gave a small smile. He held up the tray, now a couple pieces of meat heavier than it'd been when she'd left it. "I figured even if you're feeling too sick to eat it now, you could at least save it for later."

Rey took the tray slowly, her mouth watering at the sight and smell, trying to control herself from just shoving the whole lot into her mouth right then and there.

"Thank you, Poe. I really appreciate this." She looked up at him. "I'm feeling much better now. I think I just ate a little too fast at first after not having eaten anything all day."

Poe looked away and down, a somewhat pained expression tightening his smile.

"Yeah, listen, um," he looked up, meeting her gaze. "I'm sorry that I keep bringing up that whole thing…with Kylo. I just want to make sure you didn't leave because of what I said."

Rey blinked at him, trying to remember, and then released a breath of understanding.

"Oh, no, not at all, Poe. Honestly, it was my stomach."

"You sure? You seemed pretty pissed yesterday, and you were gone all day today."

Now Rey was the one to look down. "I—I just needed some time alone. To think, and meditate on some things."

"About Kylo?"

Rey shrugged. "Sort of."

Poe sighed, pursing his lips as he crossed his arms and looked away briefly to check the hallway for anyone else. Then he leaned forward in the doorway, voice low.

"Look, I'm not going to pretend that I'm on board with your plan, because from what I've seen of Kylo Ren—and he's only ever going to be 'Kylo Ren' to me—there's nothing good or worth saving about him. I don't know why he didn't kill you on the _Supremacy_, and maybe we'll never know. But I do know that he's Supreme Leader now, and he tried to kill all of us on Crait—including you." He must have noticed her hard expression because his voice softened a little. "I don't know how you plan to somehow change him to our side, and, I'm sorry, I don't think I can really help you with it. But…" He sighed again, slightly defeated. "I won't stop you from trying."

Rey nodded, accepting the small compromise as she looked down at the tray in her hands.

He stepped forward, nudging into her space, his head ducking slightly in order to catch her eye.

"Just promise me you won't do anything overtly reckless that could get yourself killed."

"Is it because that's your job?" She teased with a small smile.

He gave a small laugh, nodding. "Yeah." Then grew serious again. The look in his eyes made her heart thud in her chest.

"You're really important to us, Rey." His hand found her shoulder and squeezed it gently. "We care about you. You're the last Jedi, and that really means something to a lot of people here."

She smiled wanly, nodding. "Thank you. I'll do my best to be the Jedi you all deserve."

He gave an easy smile, nodding with a casual, "That's my girl."

Rey blinked, her smile wobbling a bit, and turned to put the tray on her desk to hide the awkwardness she felt at his words. _I'm not anyone's girl,_ she thought peevishly.

"Um, thanks again, Poe." She said over her shoulder. "I think I'll just get some rest now."

"Yeah, okay." He took a step out of her room, and she walked to the control pad to manually close the door, not trusting her Force abilities to work in that moment. She was just too flustered from everything.

"I hope you feel better tomorrow." He said.

"Thanks."

She gave him one last smile before shutting the door. As soon as it was closed she whirled around and sat at her desk, all but inhaling the food on the tray.

Maker, it felt good to be full.

* * *

That night she dreamt of blistering sands, silent screaming, and empty stomachs again. There was no Ben to accidentally wake her this time. She tossed and turned in the throws of her nightmare until her alarm yanked her back into consciousness in the morning.

Again she checked her stash box and 'fresher, and again her anxiety was assuaged.

_This is ridiculous._ She thought as she stripped out of her sweat-soaked clothes and washed herself.

She decided in spite of her bad dream that she wasn't going to let the lingering effects of the past several days affect her today. What Poe said about her being important to the people of the Resistance, and of the galaxy, really struck a chord with her. She couldn't afford to let her personal problems influence her anymore. She needed to become mentally strong, and emotionally balanced. She needed to be more like a Jedi.

If only it wasn't so hard.

* * *

Rey pointed herself in the direction of the engine rooms and started walking. She felt like seeking out Rose and helping her with whatever tasks she was assigned to that day. Rey had really started to grow very fond of the Haysian woman, especially her optimistic attitude towards things.

She almost ran straight into Poe as she exited the lift on the engine room floor, her small laugh and apology met with a nervous one from the captain.

Rey noted the feelings of discomfort coming from him but decided against asking him what was wrong. She smiled a little brighter instead, letting him pass as she finished walking out of the lift and he walked in.

"Oh, Poe," she said, turning, and his hand froze over the button panel, eyes like a caught animal. "Is Rose down here? I wanted to help her with her mechanical work today."

Poe leaned an arm against the panel, other hand coming up to his hip as he nodded a little too enthusiastically.

"Uh, yep. Yeah, she is. She's, uh, well, I was going to talk to her about something but she looked busy with…something…but I'm sure she could use some help."

Rey gave him an amused look, punctuated with a nod. "Okay, thanks, Poe."

He gave a nonchalant wave of his hand, standing straight again. "Yeah, sure, no problem."

Rey turned to go down the stairs to the lower level but Poe stopped her with a hand on her arm.

"Hey, Rey," He dropped his hand when she looked at it curiously, eyes meeting his now genuinely smiling face. Once more she found herself liking his features as she did when she'd first met him. He was just naturally charming when he smiled in such an open way.

"You know, I could try and help you with the lightsaber sometime. Maybe I've worked on something similar and might be able to help you figure out how to fix it or something." He shrugged, dimples visible even under the perpetual scruff he kept. "I figure a fresh pair of eyes never hurt anyone."

She smiled, feeling her cheeks warm as his deep brown eyes searched hers expectantly.

"That'd be really helpful. Thanks, Poe."

"Yeah, no problem. Just let me know."

"I will." She said with a nod, and then with a wave she pivoted and went down the stairs, leaving him with his quirked smile and strangely intense eyes as she did.

It didn't take long for Rey to find Rose, although the sight that met her as she turned the corner made the smile fall from her face.

The Haysian woman was seated on the ground, tools and odd bits of this and that spread all around her. She was crying openly.

Rey took a tentative step forward. "Rose? Are you alright?"

"Hm? Oh," Rose looked up, startled, then gave a wet laugh and hastily wiped her face. "Yeah, I'm fine, totally fine. You need something?"

Rey gingerly sat beside the shorter woman. "Not really. Are you sure you're okay?"

Rose looked down at her hands, lip quivering. Rey remained silent, searching the other woman's face with concerned eyes.

"It just hits me sometimes, you know?" She sniffled. "That she's not here anymore. That Paige…" Rose faltered, swallowing. Rey nodded in understanding, remembering Finn telling her about the woman who'd died during the escape from D'Qar.

Rose indicated around her at the mess. "I keep myself pretty busy with repairs, but every now and then when I have a second to think, or I see something that reminds me of her, it all comes rushing back." Tears resumed streaming down her cheeks. "And I remember that I'll never eat Bantha steak with her, or laugh with her about some stupid joke, or cry together over our parents or our home-world, ever again. She'll never know how her sacrifice saved so many lives, or meet Finn, or even know you, Rey, and be filled with so much hope for the future the way I am whenever I see you."

Rey looked back at Rose's glistening eyes and tried to smile even as her brow furrowed. There was an unpleasant tightness in her chest at Rose's last words. She shook her head.

"I'm really not anything special, Rose. You've helped out the Resistance far more than I have."

Rose scoffed, rolling her eyes animately and wiping her face. "Me? Are you kidding me? I'm nobody compared to you. You're Rey! The last Jedi! You can, like, move stuff with your _mind_ and you got to train with Luke Skywalker! And you've gone up against the First Order's Supreme Leader and lived to brag about it. Just, _wow!_ I still can't believe I even know you sometimes. First Finn, and now you." She shook her head, starry eyes unfocused for a moment. Then her eyes closed, and she sighed. When she opened them again they were apologetic.

"Paige would probably tell me to stop geeking out over you. She was a much better people talker than I've ever been. I guess that's why I like working on machines so much; they don't require much talking to in order to get them working."

Rey smiled in understanding.

Rose laughed, sniffling back her running nose. "Yelling and hitting things, however, seems to be a language the machines understand perfectly well from me."

Their combined laughter rang among the pipes and durasteel.

Rose lifted a fist, shaking it. "I'll tell ya, those engines know that when I get my thirty-six-wrench out, shit better start working right or there'll be hell to pay."

Rey snorted as she laughed heartily, imagining the tiny woman brandishing such a huge tool and yelling at silent machinery.

She caught her breath, managing to speak after a momentary battle with more laughter threatening to bubble up. "It was always the vibrohammer for me. Sand does not do wonders on machine parts, believe you me. Although, I guess a good whack with my staff always did the trick too whenever my speeder started to act up."

Rose smiled, laughter dying down, then seemed to have a curious thought as she finished cleaning her face.

"You never really talk about your life on Jakku."

Rey's grin faltered. "There's nothing really to talk about to be honest."

The shorter girl tilted her head. "I guess that depends on how long you lived there for."

Rey looked down. "A long time."

"So there's 'a long time's worth of stuff." Rose teased. Then her eyes lit up. "Were there any boys? Any cute boys? Ugh, Paige and I always had different tastes in men. 'Course we'd never really had time to really figure that stuff out, although I'm starting to think I might have a type…" she trailed off, facial features half-amazed and half worried.

Rey gave a teasing smile. "Would your type happen to be rebellious, dark, and handsome?"

Rose's face turned the color of her namesake as she spluttered out a response.

"Wha—No—! I mean—_Maybe_—I guess, well, you know— He's just so," she made a surprised face, hands up and fingers splayed wide, "_whoa_, you know? Like, one second he's trying to jump ship and the next—wait. You're talking about Finn, right?"

Rey laughed, nodding her head. "Yes, I'm talking about Finn. Who else would we be talking about?"

Rose let out an unladylike sound through her lips as she breathed out. "I don't know. I mean, I didn't really notice anyone before, but now I _really_ don't notice anyone. Except for him. He's all my brain parts seem to want to think about, and I don't even know if he notices _me_. Or if his brain parts are all mixed up like mine. Do you think he knows? Or cares about me? I seriously can't tell. He's been acting a little weird ever since Crait, but that's probably because I kissed him."

"You _what?_" Rey's eyes bulged from their sockets.

Rose's face twisted into something apologetic and yet shameless.

"It was in the heat of the moment! I barely remember it because I was in so much pain and I passed out right after, but I think it might have ruined our working relationship." Rose looked down, worry creasing her brows.

Rey smiled, nudging the woman's shoulder with her own. "Listen, Rose, I'm really no expert on this, but I think that he really cares for you."

Rose looked up. "Really?"

"Yeah, he didn't leave your side in the medbay for days until you woke up. And he's always talking about you."

Her face became incredulous. "_Really?_"

Rey nodded emphatically. Then gently touched Rose's hand to get her attention when she started to get the faraway look again.

"Listen, I really don't know a whole lot about this sort of stuff, but I remember hearing some bits of advice from different travelers and fortune tellers on Jakku. If you care about him, and he cares about you, just let whatever is meant to happen between you, happen. Don't try to force things, but don't resist them either."

Rose scoffed. "I'd probably go crazy if I tried to ignore this thing—whatever it is."

"There you go." She said, then added, "And just be yourself. Don't think about the whole 'Rebel Hero' thing too much. If you try to be someone else just because of who he is, he won't be falling for the real you."

Rose nodded seriously, looking like she'd had an epiphany.

"Yeah, you're right." She looked up and smiled. "Thanks, Rey. You're so wise. You really are a Jedi."

They both laughed, although Rey hoped she didn't sound as forced as she felt it did.

"It's so nice to have some girl talk again." Rose said with a sadder smile. Then she snapped out of her funk with a scrunch of her nose and scoffed as she stood. "But now what I really want to talk about is how the heck we're going to get these compressors to cooperate without an external modulator."

"I was thinking the same thing." Rey said with a smile, standing too. "We've got our work cut out for us for sure."

* * *

Poe's voice called from down a corridor as Rose made her way towards the mess hall with Rey.

"Rose! Hold up a sec."

After giving Poe a quizzical once-over, Rey told Rose she'd meet her there and then continued down the hallway. Rose turned to the approaching man with a smile.

"What's up, captain?"

"Hey, listen," he paused as someone passed them in the hall, then took her arm and motioned to a less busy corridor, "let's talk over there."

The smile fell from her face as she took in his serious expression and stiff body language. "Okay."

In the quiet corridor he turned to face her again, biting his bottom lip as he tried to gather his words.

Rose began to worry.

"Is this about the life support filters? Because I swear I had no idea they were gonna be that bad. I mean, when was the last time they were changed? Definitely not within the past ten years, I'll tell ya. And when we finally get them cleaned—"

"It's not about the filters, Rose."

Her mouth clamped shut. "Oh." She looked worried again. "What's this about then?"

Poe sighed, eyes closing as he pinched the bridge of his nose.

"I realized earlier, which is_ way_, way too late, that I never apologized to you about Paige."

Rose's face went slack. "What? Captain—"

"Listen, Rose, she died because of my recklessness. If I hadn't pushed to destroy the dreadnought—"

"No, Poe." She snapped, the force of her anger surprising the man into silence. "Don't you dare. Don't you dare take away her sacrifice. We both knew what we were signing up for when we joined the Resistance, and we both knew the risks of her gunning on a bomber. She gave everything she had to this movement, _everything_. So don't you dare take that away from her by telling me her death was a mistake. Don't you dare." Tears filled her eyes. She realized the ache in the palm of her hand was from tightly gripping her necklace (now forever without it's matching piece) and she released it, hand fisting at her side.

Poe looked back at her blazing tear-filled eyes with solemn understanding.

"I'm still sorry, Rose."

She nodded, chin trembling.

"It's okay, Poe." She took a shuddering breath in, and tried to smile. "I forgive you."

Somber astonishment spread slowly over his face, and then his breath was knocked from him as she gave a half-hearted punch to his gut.

Her finger was in his face as he held his middle.

"But don't you _ever_ do something like that again, Poe Dameron."

"O-okay." He wheezed, once again struggling for breath as Rose surprised him with a very strong hug. He patted her back awkwardly, and then she released him.

Rose wiped the tears from her cheeks, a bright smile once more lighting up her face.

"Well," she gave a loud sigh. "The mess hall is open now. You coming?"

* * *

The ship's engine's stopped functioning and pulled them from the hyperjump as they were just about to enter the Colonies region.

The crew immediately sprang into action, bodies running down corridors to check the engine room and life support systems. Luckily the auxiliary power unit kicked in and kept the life support systems online, but upon further inspection of the hyperspace drive the outlook was grim.

"Status update." General Organa clipped as the small team of mechanics and engineers—including Rose, Rey, Chewie, and Grent— walked onto the bridge.

Rose pulled up a holo of the damage. "There's a break in the casing of the hyperdrive, which is usually something you hear about happening to ships that are no longer in one piece, so the fact that we aren't shredded across three systems is a testament to the safety features someone remembered to install on this thing. As soon as it fissured it shut itself down."

Grent stepped up. "The good news is that it's fixable. The bad news is that we don't have the parts to fix it."

Admiral Nunes spoke up from his chair. "How does it affect the status of the main thrusters?"

Rose shook her head. "No damage to those, as far as we can tell. We'll be able to move around once we restart them, just not at hyperspeed."

The general heaved a sigh, looking at the holographic schematics of the problem before her. Rey wasn't sure, but the woman seemed to have aged substantially since she'd met her. Even so, there was a strength in her eyes when she turned to them, gripping her still-present cane in her hands.

"The hyperdrive is almost brand new. How did this happen? Does anyone know?"

C3-PO piped up from his stance beside the ever-present R2-D2.

"I wonder if the strange power surge my sensors detected yesterday had anything to do with it, General. I still remain by my analysis that it wasn't a passing solar flare, nor an electrical storm."

R2 beeped and whistled his agreement.

"And I still think you need your wiring checked." Leia said. "There's nothing on board that could cause something like that."

"That remains to be seen." Nunes droned, eyes swinging around to look reproachfully at Rey.

Her face went hot under so many gazes now directed her way, her fists clenching at her sides, heart beating in time with the red pulsing in her vision as she thought about why he would accuse her of damaging the hyperdrive. And then her stomach dropped when she quickly realized she may well have been the cause of all this. Hadn't she done something similar on Ahch-To—cracking the stone beneath her where she sat sensing the Dark Place on the island?

Rey clenched her jaw and looked down, Leia's probing stare too much for her to handle at the moment.

"Well," the general said, thankfully moving on, "It's fortunate we're in a system that might help us. We're close enough to Manaan that getting there, picking up supplies, and getting back shouldn't take too long, especially for the _Falcon_."

Chewie bellowed.

Leia gave a bemused smile. "Right, right, twelve parsecs. I've heard it before, Chewie, no need to remind me." She turned back to the group. "I'll need a full report of the damages and what we'll need to repair them with in an hour. We're near some very dangerous space with Kuat so close, so I'm sure it goes without saying that the faster we get going on this, the better."

Rey stepped forward as the mechanics voiced their compliance and filed out of the bridge.

"I can go with Chewie to Manaan and get the supplies." She needed to help fix this, especially if she was the cause of it in the first place.

The general shook her head.

"No, I want you to stay here and see what you can do to patch it up in the meantime, just in case. I'll go with Chewie."

"What?" Poe's face was not the only shocked one among the bridge staff. "General, you can't be serious. You're in no condition—"

"I'll worry about my own condition, thank you very much, Captain." She intoned back blandly.

Vice-Admiral Yaris spoke up. "I have to second the captain's objections, General. It's too dangerous for you to leave the safety of the cruiser."

"A cruiser that's as handicapped as the _Raddus_ had been?" Leia pointed out. "The _Falcon_ is far better equipped for anything we could run into than the cruiser at this point. But I doubt there'll be any trouble. The Selkath people on Manaan have always defended their neutral stance in the galaxy. They won't betray us or harm me for fear of disrupting their carefully constructed neutrality. And as for why I'm going and not someone else," She said, cutting off whatever Poe was going to say next, "I've had several dealings with many high-ranking Selkaths in the past—so much so that I doubt it will take me long to negotiate a trade. They're very meticulous people when it comes to red tape, but for me I know they'd speed up the process, as they've done before."

The command officers exchanged glances. They knew they couldn't overrule the general's authority, but even if she wasn't the head of the Resistance no one could stand against Leia Organa-Solo when she decided something.

"Admiral Nunes," She addressed, the man sitting a little straighter in his seat as he turned to her fully. "Chain of command falls to you while I'm gone."

"Yes, M'am."

Rey's heart fell a bit at that, and she pointedly avoided looking at the admiral and the haughty gleam in his eyes as he glanced at her. She decided then and there to steer clear of Nunes as much as possible while Leia was away. It shouldn't be too hard if she stays busy with the temporary repairs.

"That'll be all for now." General Organa clipped, using her cane to stand and prompting the rest of the table to rise to their feet as well.

As she passed the dark-haired captain to stand by Rey the general rolled her eyes at him. "Oh, wipe that nervous look off your face, Poe. You're coming with me."

"I am?"

"You are. I may have faith in the Selkath's peacekeeping nature, but I wasn't born yesterday."

Rey faced Leia fully. "Are you sure you don't want me to come along too? I may not have the lightsaber but I'm pretty well trained with my staff."

The older woman smiled, but there was a tightness about it that made it less reassuring.

"I know you are. But how will you help with preliminary repairs on the hyperdrive if you're not where the hyperdrive is?"

"But what if something happens?"

Leia looked around. "There's a whole ship of people who know how to fix problems, should they arise."

Rey closed her eyes, slightly frustrated. "No, I mean what if something happens to you? You're the whole backbone of the Resistance. We could very well fall apart if you were gone."

This time Leia's smile was genuinely soft as she grasped Rey's hand in her weathered one.

"I may look good for my age, but I'm not going to be around forever, Rey."

Rey nodded wordlessly, swallowing back the lump that had risen in her throat. Poe looked down, brows creased.

Leia sighed, and continued. "The Resistance is growing stronger every day that Luke's story spreads. Just believing that the Jedi are coming back will be enough to keep the hope going, and remind people that we've defeated great enemies like the First Order before. Rey," she squeezed her hand, "With Luke gone, you're our greatest chance right now."

The meaning in her eyes as she said it told Rey what she really meant: _You're the one who will finally bring balance to the galaxy._

Rey schooled her features as best she could to keep from betraying the sudden feeling of painful tightness in her chest. Her stomach felt like lead in her abdomen.

"I'll do my best, General." She promised.

Leia gently patted her cheek, the motherly affection making Rey's heart twist in a different way now.

"I don't doubt it for a minute." She said with confidence. She dropped her hand, her General persona returning with the set of her shoulders. "I'm sure they could really use your help down in the engine room now."

Rey nodded, understanding that she was being dismissed. "Of course." And then she left.

Poe and Leia watched her leave, the young pilot turning to the elder woman after a moment.

"You do look damn good for your age, General."

"Watch it, Captain."

* * *

The preparations on the _Falcon_ didn't take too long after the list of repair items was handed over. They loaded up the freighter with half the remaining credits the Resistance carried anymore, and hoped it would be enough. They still needed to pick up supplies on Chandrila, but perhaps their pleas to their remaining allies would result in more aid, and they won't have to worry too much about using so many credits on this emergency trip.

The more Rey thought about it the worse she felt, knowing that (probably) because of her they were in an even tighter spot financially than they'd been in before. She'd just have to find a way to make it up to them, to compensate for the trouble she'd caused everyone (and the danger she's put them in).

Poe came up to her, Finn, and Rose as they were finishing up the pre-flight prep.

"How's it looking?"

Rose shrugged. "Same as it did an hour ago."

"That's reassuring." He grumbled.

Finn looked at Rose with confidence, then back at the captain.

"It'll get fixed." He said, and then he and Poe clasped each other's shoulders once in farewell.

"Keep her safe." Finn added. Poe nodded.

"I promise the _Millennium Falcon_ will return as soundly as she leaves."

"I meant the General."

"Oh." Poe grinned cheekily. "Yeah, I'll keep her safe too."

Rose rolled her eyes with a smile. "You'll probably need more protection than she does. Bet you five credits when things go south, she's going to be the one to save your cocky hide."

Poe gave a half-shrug, dropping his arms from Finn. "I wouldn't doubt it."

And then Poe turned to Rey, surprising her with a chaste embrace. He'd already let go and backed up a step before she could even bring her arms up to hesitantly return it.

"Keep these two in line while I'm gone, Rey." He pointed a thumb in their direction. "Or who knows what else will end up broken."

Finn shook his head, trying to keep from smiling. "You know, I'm starting to think I should have left you on that Star Destroyer."

"Aw, come on, bud, you don't mean that."

"Yes I do."

"Well It's a good thing he didn't." Rey said, thinking of all the people Poe had saved so far, even in spite of the many lost because of his rash decisions. He was still a good man, and an amazing pilot. He still wanted to do good for the galaxy.

Poe's eyes swung back to look at her, the warmth in his small smile bringing out his handsome features again.

"Yeah, it's a good thing he didn't."

Rey saw Finn and Rose exchange a glance from the corner of her eye and quickly gave a final nod in farewell, with a "See you later," to Poe before turning to go see Leia off.

Her goodbye to the older woman was less sentimental than she felt like it had the potential to be. The tightness in her chest had returned, along with the buzzing, and it took all her willpower to not hold onto Leia and never let go when they embraced. She could tell that the general had felt her slight trembling by the crease between her brows and the sad lilt in the set of her smile.

"I'll be fine, Rey." She reassured, hand brushing some of Rey's loose bangs behind her ear. "I've been through too much crap in my long life to give in to anything now. It'll be a routine run—there and back in just a couple of days."

Rey nodded, not trusting her voice.

"And besides," Leia added, "you'll be busy enough with temporary repairs and training that you'll hardly have time enough to miss us. So go on and get rid of that mopey expression. You guys are going to give me a complex with all this worrying."

They both smiled, Rey's a bit watery but she held back her tears. They looked at each other, feeling things in the Force that spoke without words. Rey didn't know how to interpret it, but it wasn't an altogether bad feeling. Leia's face turned serious after a moment though.

"You be careful, Rey."

Rey frowned, not sure what had prompted this warning. But she nodded.

"I will."

Chewie growled from the _Falcon_'s ramp, letting them know the ship was ready to go whenever they were done. Without another word Leia stepped away from Rey, and with final farewells to the command staff who had assembled, made her way up the ramp after Poe and the ever loyal BB-8.

The remaining crew and staff stood back at the _Falcon_ lifted off, swung around, and flew out of the hangar. It became a flash of light as it jumped to hyperspeed, and then it was gone.

* * *

Rey spent the rest of the day in the engine room, helping to deconstruct the hyperdrive and then search the ship for anything that could help replace the broken parts. It was a moot task though, as they needed the actual manufactured parts in order for it to be stable. Otherwise they'd end up with more than just a fissure next time they tried to hyperjump.

Still, though, the act of scavenging around helped clear her mind of the bad feeling in her gut. It was nostalgic in a way, climbing about the inner workings of the ship, learning it's secret passageways made of wire and pipe and durasteel.

Between lunch and dinner she snuck by the kitchens again to snag some cooling leftovers. Jerung caught her but merely waved her on with a secretive grin, to which she gave an appreciative nod back, returning to her room to deposit her finds in her food box.

She spent time with Finn and Rose, watching their somewhat awkward interactions melt into more easy camaraderie as they talked about this and that, or worked on something else that needed to be fixed.

And still, she couldn't shake the dark pulses echoing in the Force. Was it Ben? Or Leia? Or maybe something else entirely? She wasn't sure, and it was giving her a headache trying to figure it out.

Soon after dinner had ended and she'd received reassurances that her help wasn't required anymore for the night, she went to bed. She was physically and mentally exhausted, and as she crawled beneath her blanket, she tiredly hoped that a new day would bring better things for all of them.

* * *

In a half-dreamed state Rey awoke slowly on her side to her forehead pressed not-so-uncomfortably against something warm and firm. And, she noted that her arms—folded at her chest, hands cradled beneath her chin—were also pressed against the warm and firm thing. She decided to pay it no mind, sleep winning out over figuring out why this felt so out of place.

As she was drifting back into her pleasant dream, nuzzling into the musky scent that was slightly familiar and right at her nose, the warm and firm thing moved, expanding slightly against her. A long sigh ruffled her hair, and with a sinking heart she begrudgingly opened her eyes.

Dark cloth greeted her. She moved her head back slightly, expanding her view until she knew for a fact that yes, it was Ben's clothed chest she was pressed against, his arm draped casually over her waist, other arm laid out above her head, face a vision of slumber just inches above her own.

Rey gave a long, frustrated sigh herself.

"For Maker's sake." She mumbled quietly. "Why does this keep happening at night?"

Ben made a noise in his throat, startling her a little.

With his eyes still closed he grumbled back, "Don'make a fuss about't this time. Jus go back t' sleep."

"'M'not making a fuss." She muttered.

"Y'ssyouare."

She opened her mouth to argue groggily back but he shushed her with another long breath out, barely making any effort with it, and pulled her closer until her forehead was pressed once more to his muscled chest. The heat of his breath warmed the crown of her head, another sort of humming warmth spreading from the spot where the pads of his fingers gently touched the back of her neck through her mussed hair.

She wanted to protest, to move away, to not let this happen (whatever it was), because this was dangerous in more ways than one, but in spite of how her heart had leapt at his tightening embrace she found that it was so comforting laying like this. No animosity, no war, no problems on the ship. Just the two of them, cocooned in a warm peace, the Force a serene blanket over everything. Even the electric hum at the points where they touched—which had been so overwhelming the last time they'd been like this—was languid in it's movements between their bodies.

She relaxed after only a moment of barely-attempted objection. Her heartbeat slowed back down as she breathed him in, sensing his own brief touch with consciousness begin to waver back on the edge of sleep as well. Her eyelids drooped closed, and she fell into a blissful dreamscape, lulled by the sound of his steady breathing and strong heartbeat beneath her hands.


	6. With Friends Like These

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Kylo continues to assert his authority, we see things from Tomaxx's POV, and the dynamics between the Knights of Ren begin to unfold.

* * *

Supreme Leader Kylo Ren sat in the head chair of the long conference table, prompting the rest of the table’s occupants to follow suit. The First Order high command, while usually stony and precise in their appearance and attitude, were for the most part visually uneasy this morning. This was probably due in part because the Knights of Ren were stationed around the meeting room like silent messengers of death, waiting for a wayward soul to commit some sort of mistake and be silenced forever with the flick of a blade or twitch of a trigger.  
  
General Hux was the only one not looking uncomfortable in his seat. Rather, he looked his usual frigid self with only a few bruises beneath his eyes the bacta couldn’t quite get rid of to betray what had transpired in the training room the day before. He’d been much more subdued since then, with nary a sly remark or mocking tone. Only the set of his jaw and the flare of his nostrils had given away his dislike of the current status of things anymore, but he wisely kept his biting thoughts to himself.  
  
Kylo took the change as a step in the right direction, but did not trust it to last.  
  
“Gentlemen,” he intoned, then acknowledged the females present with, “Ladies. I’ve been hearing conflicting stories of our progress. I hope I’m able to leave this room this morning with more confidence in your abilities. First, what state is the _Supremacy_ in?”  
  
“Supreme Leader,” Captain Peavey began, bringing a hologram of the bisected Mega-class Star Dreadnought up above the table. “I’ve been in contact with the representatives at Kuat-Entralla Engineering for the past several weeks. After some negotiations they’ve sent their best engineers and workers to begin repairing the Supremacy. I’ve also been informed that the eight Star Destroyers we lost are ready to be replaced, plus two more Dreadnoughts and an Executor-class Star Dreadnought for your personal use until the _Supremacy_ can be used as the flagship again.”  
  
“How long will the repairs take?”  
  
“They estimate four months. The Executor-class ship will be ready in one week.”  
  
Kylo nodded. “Excellent.”  
  
They were finally getting their fleet back, and he would have a ship of his own, free from the lingering presence of Snoke and the reminders of his past failings. With this new armada Kylo could truly begin to shape the galaxy to his vision.  
  
Captain Peavey looked both relieved and pained. Kylo could sense something beneath the surface of his anxiety and narrowed his eyes.  
  
“What is it?”  
  
If the Captain was surprised that Kylo knew he had more to say, he didn’t show it. He exchanged glances with Captain Mitaka who looked like he’d rather be anywhere else but in his seat, his eyes flickering about the Knights. Peavey looked back at Kylo, resigned.  
  
“As you may know, we have various contracts with institutions who provide us with our weapons and starships. Kuat-Entralla Engineering, Sienar-Jaemus Army Systems, and Aratech-Loratus have been the backbone of the First Order, even in spite of the risks of exposure to the Galactic Republic. Sonn-Blas Corporation was created by them to circumvent the Galactic Concordance, but now that the Galactic Concordance has no enforcing body we can begin creating new contracts with institutions interested in doing business with us openly.”  
  
Kylo’s frown deepened. “Why would we want to change our existing contracts, if they’ve benefitted us so well?”  
  
“Both Sienar-Jaemus and Sonn-Blas have increased the cost of their products substantially, against contract.” The captain paused, the table occupants eyeing Kylo tensely as if waiting for him to explode.  
  
Did they really think him so juvenile to act on his temper at every little thing anymore? This matter especially was not something he gave more than two thoughts about. It was their job to make sure contracts were adhered to. Not his.  
  
Having decided that the Supreme Leader wasn’t about to cut anyone in half, the Captain continued. “If we are to continue to afford our campaigns we must either attempt to negotiate new terms with them or find more affordable options.”  
  
Kylo thought silently for a moment, weighing the options.  
  
“And what of our agents formerly of the Galactic Republic? Have they pulled their support so soon after we destroyed their political enemies for them?” The bite in his tone was sharp. He hated politicians, but they had their uses.  
  
“Senators Ro-Kiintor and Apolin are still with us, as well as Fatil and Giller. Only Arbo has displayed some hesitance, in fear that the resistance to our unfolding presence on Coruscant will lead to too much destruction of valuable property.”  
  
General Hux finally spoke up. “Which is the risk of war, Captain, as Arbo should know. Coruscant has been through wars and rebellions before and has risen back up each time.”  
  
Peavey did not back down. “If we want to capitalize on the Core worlds we would do well to make sure they remain in one piece.”  
  
“We will have all the time in the galaxy to fix it to our liking. With victory comes sacrifice and casualty, Captain Peavey, as you should know from the time of the Empire.”  
  
“Gentlemen,” Kylo droned, voice tight with impatience. “I grow weary of this bickering. Captain Peavey, tell Arbo we’ll endeavor to prevent too much loss, as long as we continue to have his full support in our total conquest of Coruscant. The planet and it’s system will be under our control, one way or the other. We cannot dally any longer in this though. The Resistance grows stronger every day that we do not establish executive authority.”  
  
“And thus we return to the problem at hand, Supreme Leader.” Peavey said. “We have moved in and established some presence on many of the Core worlds, but in order to take control of the relevant systems we need more ships, more weapons. What shall we do about the contracts?”  
  
Kylo sat still for a moment, pondering.  
  
“Open the bidding to all.” He said after a moment. “Anyone who had been held back by the stranglehold of the Galactic Concordance will be free to act now. If any of our existing contractual partners have an issue with it, inform them that the recent change in leadership nullifies any preceding contracts. If they wish to continue doing business with us they will need to renegotiate.”  
  
“Yes, Supreme Leader.”  
  
Kylo sensed something from Tomaxx, who was standing against the wall behind him. It was a sort of inquiry of permission that touched the very edges of Kylo’s mind.  
  
“Tomaxx,” he acknowledged with a small turn of his head. “You have something to say?”  
  
“Master,” Tomaxx’s modified voice filtered from his mask. He stepped forward to stand at Kylo’s right and the members at the table stiffened and shifted uncomfortably.  
  
“I read what Snoke had planned in the eventuality of the Republic’s demise, as I’m sure you all have.”  
  
“We have.” Hux intoned. “And what great insight do you have for us, Lord Ren?”  
  
“I was quite surprised to find that there basically was no plan, and there continues to be very little planned for our next step. What have you all been doing all this time?” The officers looked to each other, and then at General Hux. The man didn’t whither beneath the gazes pointed his way, but squared himself boldly, arrogantly.  
  
“Due to the circumstances of it’s birth, the First Order has had to remain in a stasis of constant evolution otherwise the first obstacle we came to would have broken us. Leader Snoke may not have had a long-term, detailed plan formed, but he did not lead us astray during his tenure. He allowed for the technological might of the First Order to flourish, and we were able to bring the galaxy to it’s knees when we obliterated the Hosnian system. We would not be at this point in our march towards total victory without his way of leadership and improvised strategy.”  
  
Tomaxx’s mask tilted minutely towards him. “And yet Starkiller base was destroyed—triggered into implosion after years of construction and cost, and after only one use.”  
  
“One was enough.” Hux sneered. “The galaxy trembles in fear of us now. Taking control of the Core and Inner Rim systems will just be a matter of time.”  
  
“And how do you plan to use that time, General?” Kylo asked, his patience depleting more. “Will you be able to come up with an actual plan, or am I assumed to do everything for you the way Snoke did?”  
  
“No, Supreme Leader, I assure you I am capable of directing our forces effectively.”  
  
“To save you time, I have a plan for your consideration,” Tomaxx addressed to the table, pulling up a map of the galaxy to replace the holo of the broken _Supremacy_. A muscle on Hux’s jaw twitched but he remained silent as he seethed.  
  
Tomaxx indicated to the holo. “As you are all aware, currently our forces have moved to blockade several key trade routes. And aside from establishing a presence on Coruscant the First Order navy has not advanced to have soldiers on-planet for any other Core world. I propose we use the nearest starships and begin immediate occupation of Brentaal IV.”  
  
There was a pause, and then Captain Peavey’s face dawned with understanding. “You want to reuse the old Republic Academy facilities there.”  
  
“Yes. All of the First Order training camps are on starships and worlds in the Unknown Region. By putting a heavy military presence right in the heart of the Core worlds we will have better control than if we roamed around on another Mega-class Dreadnought like the _Supremacy_.”  
  
“It was Leader Snoke’s objective to use the Supremacy as a mobile capital.” Hux argued. “To strengthen the First Order by making it a harder target to hit than a capital on any world. The _Supremacy_ has everything we need to build and maintain our forces.”  
  
Tomaxx switched the holo back to the broken ship. “And yet here we are, General, and where is Snoke’s mobile capital?”  
  
Hux looked at the holo with an air of disdain and regret. It was no secret the man had coveted the ship, and it was no secret either that his failure to react aptly to the _Raddus_’s threat had caused the Star Dreadnought to be cleaved in two. Kylo could feel the restrained frustration filtering from Captain Peavey and Captain Yago, the latter which had been the commanding officer of the_ Supremacy_ before Hux had boarded and taken it under his flag. They did very well to hide their true feelings under the guise of respect to the chain of command, but Kylo knew the old Imperial officers had little respect for their general.  
  
Hardly anyone did. Kylo allowed himself the fleeting idea of just killing Hux already and saving them all the trouble of his brashness, but he remembered the words Snoke had said to him about weakness properly manipulated becoming a sharp tool and dismissed the idea.  
  
For now.  
  
“Your decision to use Starkiller brought us victory over the Republic, for which you should be commended, General.” Tomaxx added, surprising the room. “It would have been almost impossible to plan for the kind of maneuver the Resistance must have performed in order to get past the shields without being detected. Almost no one would have been able to succeed. The fact they also managed to turn off the shields is something to investigate.”  
  
“It was determined the defected trooper acquired the codes and turned them off himself.” Mitaka said hesitantly, exchanging a nervous glance with Hux.  
  
“Be that as it may, we need to learn from our mistakes. Shields should require two-part authentication to be accessed for any reason now. To be shut down, a third auxiliary control will confirm and execute. There should be more ground sensors to detect low-flying craft, and any units determined to be paramount to the survival of the functionality of our weaponry should be protected by it’s own closed shield network and monitored heavily. We are a force of intelligence and evolution, as you said, General. Let’s make sure we continue to evolve.”  
  
Tomaxx turned back fully to face Kylo. “Which brings me to another point, Master. We should open up the military academies for all.”  
  
Hux’s bruises turned a darker shade of purple. “_What?_ And let just any kind of rabble join the ranks? Are you _joking?_”  
  
“No, General.” Tomaxx droned, the voice modifier crackling. “I’m not. There is an entire galaxy of people who have suffered in silence due to the inefficiencies of the Galactic Senate. The Resistance is trying to gain support from those people by promising them a better life, but it’s a promise without any proof. We have the advantage in every way: finance, military numbers, armament, and political support. If we can show the galaxy that the First Order has the means _right now_ to settle peace among the chaos, they will turn a deaf ear to the empty promises from the Resistance.” He looked between the officers, and Kylo noted their considering expressions.  
  
The Knight folded his arms. “Let the oppressed and downtrodden know our symbol as one of evolution. Through the First Order the resilient can thrive, not just survive. Through the First Order, anyone with skill can become someone of merit and rise above the station they were born in. Once we have enough of them listening, enough of them believing in our way of peace and order, then we can truly begin to expose the Resistance for the rebel propaganda machine that it is. And the galaxy will help us defeat them.”  
  
“And how do you propose we fund such a campaign?” Hux asked with a sneer.  
  
“Set up checkpoints and tax imports and exports through trade regulation.”  
  
Captain Peavey frowned. “That will make our political friends very nervous.”  
  
Kylo blinked lazily. “Maker forbid we cause anyone to have to give up one of their luxury space yachts, Captain. If money is such a deciding factor for these politicians then it will only make them easier to control. And it will make the worlds that continue to resist our rule break, especially once we fortify our blockades on their trade routes.”  
  
Tomaxx nodded in agreement. “Sometimes in order to beat an enemy, you have to appeal to their inner vices.”  
  
“This would only lead to a stronger black market between the systems.” Hux argued.  
  
“Then we find a way to infiltrate and control that too.” Tomaxx said. “At this point our numbers will only continue to grow, General. Your defeatism is unbecoming of one who has accomplished so much at such a young age.”  
  
Before Hux could reply, the door slid open, prompting the Knights closest to the door—Cseenan and Zhin-Tok—to shoulder a customized A280 blaster rifle and switch to a defensive stance with dual vibro-arbir blades (respectively) as a female officer stepped into the room.  
  
The usually near-robotically mannered officer froze in place, first eyeing the blades and blaster barrel held in tense positions to her right and left, and then seeking out Kylo’s gaze among the throng of high command personnel now looking her way.  
  
“Supreme Leader?” She called hesitantly. “I have a message from the comms officer.”  
  
Kylo nodded his permission for her to approach, making a mental note to commend his Knights on their quick reaction, no matter how unlikely the threat.  
  
On brisk feet she came to his side, handing him the datapad she’d clutched to her chest like a shield. He dismissed her with a small wave, trying to ignore the way Cseenan was obviously enjoying her discomfort as the Barabel pointedly watched her walk by him out the door. Dyarron Ren gave him the smallest of head shakes from his station, and Kylo would have bet fifty credits that Cseenan’s look his way was one of a toothy grin beneath his mask.  
  
Kylo brought himself back to the datapad and scanned the information quickly.  
  
“The Corporate Sector Authority liaisons will be arriving shortly.” He looked up. “Let us decide on our next plan of advancement until they do, at which time we shall move on and begin talks with the CSA.”  
  
\---------------------------------------------------------------------------------  
  
The Corporate Sector Authority was a group of star systems in the Outer Rim whose alliance to each other was based purely on their shared belief that corporate entities should be able to govern their own properties and territory. The near-tyrannical government was run by a group of 55 powerful corporations, whose high-ranking business executives comprised the managing body: the Direx board. They’d governed largely independent from any ruling authority in the galaxy since their official formation several hundred years ago, even given their own independence from other ruling authorities by Emperor Palpatine himself during the time of the Empire.  
  
It was through the various loopholes and middlemen in the CSA that the First Order had been able to bribe various New Republic Senators and receive funding in return. The First Order would not be in it’s current position without the sleight-of-hand provided by the financial czars among the Corporate Sector.  
  
“…and so, by divesting from the sequential-pay bonds, which in pooled sectors are not prorated unless you are looking to hedge them, you will be able to insulate the higher-yield conduits of the Inner Rim marketplace and…”  
  
Kylo’s eye twitched as the robust man continued to drone on and on and on. For the better part of almost—Kylo glanced at the chrono on his datapad—_four kriffing hours_, this blubberish man and his associates had been giving them every kriffing detail of every _fucking_ account that the First Order had and could have with them, including subsidiary, third party, and shadow accounts.  
  
Just an hour or so after Vump Heery and his ilk had started going on about everything in the First Order finances, the Knights had begun to get antsy. Torca Ren had started flicking open her monomolecular switchblade and clicking it closed over and over again, watching with glee as the CSA liaisons become more and more uncomfortable in the growing tension of the room, until Kylo had finally dismissed the Knights.  
  
Tomaxx was the only one to stay, which Kylo was grateful for because he had very little patience for these matters and—he would admit with no damage to his pride— Tomaxx had much more experience and know-how in broad financial business. His education and family-name station in the Chiss Ascendancy—a cluster of planets in the Unknown Region where his secretive people lived in isolation—had all but guaranteed he would be far more learned in these matters than anyone else Kylo knew.  
  
After two and a half hours they’d broken for lunch, only to come back to more droning and financial jargon, and the only things Kylo had been able to focus on for the past twenty minutes were the way Vump’s fatty jowls trembled and undulated as he spoke, and how, for some kriffing reason, whenever he pronounced a word that ended in ‘ts’ he had a lisp. But only ‘ts’. ‘Bonds’ sounded like ‘bonds’, but ‘conduits’ sounded like ‘conduith’, and the small difference was beginning to drive Kylo mad.  
  
Kylo couldn’t afford to let his temper show with these men, their alliance with the First Order perhaps more important than any other functioning part of the galaxy, and so he sat silently breathing, trying to keep his temper from flaring.  
  
On the opposite end of things, he was calming himself so well that he was actually worried he was going to fall asleep soon, and by the stifled yawns and bleary eyes of the command officers still present he wasn’t the only one.  
  
Tomaxx was perhaps the only one still actively engaged and listening, his mask on to hide his face but his Force signature conveying his continual interest and engrossment. More than once he’d asked clarifying questions about something that went right over Kylo’s head, the answers given by Vump’s twig-like assistant seemingly more convoluted than before, but Tomaxx merely nodded in understanding and took notes on his datapad.  
  
After another long fifteen minutes of financial drivel Kylo felt like just hanging it all and igniting his lightsaber through the middle of the holotable just to have an excuse to get up and leave. Just as he was weighing the pros and cons of such an act, he felt something brush against the edges of his mind and he immediately snapped out of his lethargy. If the sudden intrusion caused him to physically flinch, no one could say. He would deny it anyways.  
  
Who was trying to enter his mind? He looked to Tomaxx but the Knight was still engrossed in whatever Vump was saying now, and it hadn’t felt like his presence. So then who—?  
  
There it was again.  
  
Another brush against his mind had him pulling up all of his mental shields as he tried to ignore the small shiver that went down his spine from the contact. He blinked and quickly realized after analyzing the intruder that it was Rey’s presence trying to wheedle into his psyche.  
  
He frowned, casting his eyes around the room to see if somehow in his boredom he’d missed the signs of a Force connection. But she wasn’t there, and the familiar vivid hum of her presence was absent.  
  
Had she somehow reached out to him through the Force? Was her meditation that much progressed?  
  
It was impressive nevertheless, although he shouldn’t be surprised. She was an incredibly quick learner. But now the question remained, why was she trying to access his mind? Was she trying to spy?  
  
If so, she was doing a marvelously terrible job.  
  
He could feel her slight indignation at the suddenness of his walls, but still she poked and prodded—although he quickly realized there was nothing malicious or decisive about it. He could only sense a naive curiosity.  
  
Kylo almost laughed. Did she have any idea what she was doing? Or was this just another ability she’d stumbled upon?  
  
Looking around once more to make sure no one was paying him attention, Kylo decided that playing along with Rey’s attempts to penetrate his mind was much more appealing a thing to do than sit here trying not to cut the table in half in boredom. So with careful concentration he loosened the shields of his mind, feeling more of her light Force signature filter in along with her amusingly ignorant inquisitiveness, and reached out with his senses to make contact with her.  
  
He assumed she’d immediately shy away from him, especially since she’d hated how he’d gone into her mind on Starkiller. But as he sank into her mind and let small parts of her enter into his, she just embraced him. In fact, she just continued to send her little pulsing probes, trying to figure him out without actually trying to force her way into his head.  
  
Kylo held back the small smirk he felt twitching on the end of his lips.  
  
_“What are you doing, Rey?”_ He asked her in thought.  
  
And just as he predicted, her surprise bloomed through the bond. Her voice was so clear, he almost thought she was right beside him, speaking into his ear—and yet her voice came from within him as well.  
  
_“Ben?”_  
  
For a small moment he looked forward to the welcomed distraction conversing with her would bring as Vump opened another long file on his datapad and began speaking. But just as quickly as she came, Rey disappeared. The act was so sudden it was almost a little painful, so entangled were their minds when she wrenched herself away.  
  
Slightly disappointed, Kylo pulled himself back behind his shields before Tomaxx could notice anything, taking in a deep breath to settle his pounding heart. Why would she reach out to him, only to pull away once he reached back? What was the point of this exercise? No doubt she was testing her powers, discovering her limits and pushing beyond them. It had been only a day or so since he’d reached out to her after his nightmare after all, and she had a penchant for mimicking him whenever he used his powers around her.  
  
It almost made him proud.  
  
She still refused to let him teach her, but she was learning from him nevertheless. It brought back his point that she wouldn’t have her powers without him, that her strength in the light was only because of his strength in the dark. But he also knew that she was strong just because she was Rey. Even without his existence, he had a feeling she would thrive in the Force all on her own.  
  
Still, though, perhaps at some point he might be able to convince her to become his apprentice by showing her all that she’d learned from him subconsciously._ Imagine how powerful you could become if you’d only let me truly teach you, Rey._  
  
Somehow he’d find a way to get her by his side. Even if he had to kill all of her ‘friends’ to do it.  
  
“…and so, Supreme Leader, as you can see on this sheet, the accounts are…”  
  
Kylo gave a long sigh, groaning internally. _If I don’t end up killing everyone in this room and damning the First Order first._  
  
\---------------------------------------------------------------------------------  
  
Kylo had the Knights meet him for combat training after the CSA liaisons were finally, _finally_, done for now. He was desperate to burn off the buzzing energy from being stuck listening to financial nonsense for most of the day, as well as sweat out his frustrations about Rey.  
  
The more he’d sat there thinking about it, the more cross he’d become. Sure, she’d managed to handle experimenting with the Force just fine so far, but with her powers the way they were she was bound to lose control at some point. And when that happens he couldn’t care less what befalls the Resistance, but if she hurts herself….  
  
_ If only she wasn’t so kriffing stubborn!_  
  
Kylo gripped his lightsaber tighter and lunged at Dyarron, who blocked his attack with his giant Mandalorian sword. The weapon weighed at least fifty pounds, was a good four feet long and eight inches wide, but Dyarron had found a way to use the Force to help him wield it with mastery. At times he moved so fast it almost appeared feather-light. It wasn’t until you tried to lift the thing that you realized it’s true density.  
  
_A dense weapon for a dense man_, Kylo thought. What Dyarron lacked in height he more than made up for in bulk. And as he swung his blade around, catching Kylo’s lightsaber in a parry, Kylo had to pull even more than usual from the Force to help keep himself from losing his saber or being struck to the ground by pure inertia. If there was one weapon that he thought had the potential to shatter his lightsaber, it was Dyarron’s Mandalorian steel sword.  
  
The shock of the impact of weapons reverberated up his arms and made him grit his teeth and grunt, but he would not be defeated. Using the Force he pushed back against Dyarron, causing the man to stumble back a couple steps before he was able to catch his footing and right himself. Kylo barely gave him the time before he swept his lightsaber out, aiming for Dyarron’s legs. The Knight managed to jerk his legs back to avoid having them sliced at the knee, but couldn’t avoid the grazed burn on his shin.  
  
He growled in pain and immediately held up the blade like a shield as Kylo brought his saber down in what would have cut the Knight in half from shoulder to hip. They broke apart once more, each breathing hard as they readjusted their stances, Kylo eyeing his foe for any openings.  
  
The other Knights were on the other end of the room, switching between their own duels and tending to their various weapons, occasionally peering over to watch their fight. Kylo had begun dueling with each of them individually to sense where their strengths and weaknesses lay anymore, giving them guidance where he saw fit.  
  
The only two Knights who had any chance at actually beating him in a duel were Tomaxx and Zhin-Tok, the former being a natural expert in anything he set his mind to and the latter coming from a clan of warriors who began teaching their young how to fight with a sword as soon as they were old enough to hold one. Kylo had yet to fight them one-on-one since their return, but was looking forward to the challenge nonetheless.  
  
Dyarron used Kylo’s momentary lapse to lift his sword and swing it around, using it’s inertia to build speed and power, adding his own dark Force energy to the motion. The sword acted as a conduit of sorts, concentrating the Force and building it up until he brought it through the swing with a loud cry, where the energy was released and sent barreling towards Kylo like a sonic blast.  
  
Kylo planted his feet and brought his saber up, trying to use the Force to make a shield against the onslaught, or at least redirect it away from him. His shield held, but the force still pushed him backwards, his feet sliding on the scuffed obsidian floor. He managed to right himself just as Dyarron’s blade came down, Kylo’s hand coming up to use the Force to stop it an inch from his head.  
  
The Master strengthened his mental grip on the weapon, then as he stood he pivoted and simultaneously threw both Mandalorian blade and wielder, using Dyarron’s own momentum against him.  
  
The Knight flew several feet and then crashed to the floor, his blade clanging down ten feet away. Kylo adjusted his hands on the handle of his lightsaber, his mind working to decide, not whether he should attack Dyarron while he was down, but how. Cut his other shin, or just go for his torso? He had other weapons hidden on his person, that much Kylo was certain, so he wasn’t completely defenseless. And he had the Force besides.  
  
But before he could make a move towards the fallen Knight, Kylo felt the heated air around him shift and pulse with the Force. The sounds of his Knights practicing became dampened, as if Kylo had been submerged under water. And yet, at the same time, the air was echoing strangely around him with the vague murmurs of too many voices.  
  
Heart hammering in his chest, sweat dripping from his face and neck, he turned and saw Rey sitting on a bench beside the weapons rack. Her hands were balled into tight fists in her lap, her back ramrod straight. She looked at the air around her with her eyes as if searching for something, and then her gaze was caught in his once more.  
  
He could feel her presence as one feels a cool breeze on a sweltering day—He desperately craved more. The adrenaline in his veins only heightened the static effects of their connection, sending a wave of pleasurable electricity all over his body.  
  
Seeing her sitting there, even so stiffly, almost felt like she’d been watching him train the whole time. The thought suddenly made him even more warm than before. In fact, he was burning up all over. The way she was just there, seemingly appraising him, made him want to set fire to anyone who would keep her from him. Made him want to grab her right now and never let her go.  
  
The last time he’d been this worked up had been that day in Snoke’s throne room. Then, too, he’d felt an electric high after they’d fought side by side to defeat Snoke’s praetorian guards. Then, too, he’d felt a fiery need in regards to her, a flame that was changed into renewed (albeit, enraged) purpose when she’d turned towards her precious Resistance fleet instead of to him. That naive girl. A nerve beneath Kylo’s eye twitched at the memory of it all.  
  
Before he could make a move towards her, he saw in the corner of his eye that Dyarron had used his small lapse in concentration to get up and was now coming towards him quickly with his sword in hand. Immediately Kylo sank back into position, moving to meet the Knight’s swing with a furious parry.  
  
He heard Rey stand suddenly, the movement catching his eye and causing him to lose focus again. With their swords locked at the hilt, neither of them could move, but Dyarron used his heavier gait to shove Kylo with his shoulder, knocking him back enough to free his weapon.  
  
_“Rey? You okay?”_ Kylo heard, like a ripple in the air. Immediately his wrath reemerged as he recognized the Traitor’s voice. It was like a spark to speeder fuel, a red haze filling his sight as the Dark side of the Force bellowed around him.  
  
“I feel sick.” Rey mumbled back, just barely audible to him, and he wanted to scream at her ‘you liar! I know what you’re feeling!’, but instead he just went for the attack on Dyarron, putting the Knight immediately on the defensive as he ceaselessly went after his weak points again and again and again.  
  
Rey disappeared from his sight, her flight more than just visible as he felt an uncomfortable pull, as if something was trying to tug out his organs. He _hated_ it. But instead of ignoring it he focused on it, adding it to his ire, making him stronger in the Dark side as he brought his blade down on Dyarron’s sword, almost knocking it from his grasp again.  
  
Finally the connection ended, and Kylo pushed at Dyarron with the Force, sending the Knight flying into the far wall twenty feet away. The Knight landed in a heap on the obsidian floor, shakily attempted to stand but ultimately slumped against the wall, breathing heavily.  
  
He said something, his voice too warped by his mask to be understood.  
  
“What?” Kylo sneered, prompting Dyarron to sluggishly remove his helmet. The back of it revealed a long crack in the otherwise strong metal.  
  
“I yield.” The Knight slurred, his hand coming away bloodied after rubbing the back of his head.  
  
“What?” Kylo repeated lowly, his own blood still rushing through his veins. He adjusted his grip on his saber, his hands tingling with pins and needles. He slowly approached the fallen Knight, shaking his head.  
  
“No, there is no yielding. You are either the victor, or the defeated. You are still alive, so you have not been defeated. Get up.” He shoved Dyarron’s blade with his foot, satisfied to see the man catch the hilt and, after a moment where he tried to catch his breath, shakily rise. The Knight left a smeared bloody hand print on the wall as he pushed away from it, wiping the rest of the blood on his side before taking his sword in two hands. He left his ruined helmet on the floor.  
  
Kylo could sense the others’ attention had been drawn to their battle, a tenseness in the air as they waited to see what would happen. They were probably wondering if any of them would have to step in and keep Kylo from killing Dyarron.  
  
He only wanted them to think he was capable of doing it. He was willing to beat them into unconsciousness and allow them to pull him back from making a killing blow just to keep them in fear of his wrath. It was how Snoke maintained his authority and their subservience, and it was how Kylo decided he was going to do the same. He could not rely on their past loyalties, and as powerful as their oaths had been, they could still be broken. No, it was better to remind them frequently just what he was capable of.  
  
He would not be so easily betrayed and beaten.  
  
The rest of the fight with Dyarron lasted longer than anticipated, especially with the Knight fighting to keep standing at times. He occasionally looked lost and confused, no doubt suffering a concussion from being slammed into the wall. But he held out, dealing a couple goods blows to Kylo with his fists and feet whenever he wasn’t swinging his sword around.  
  
In the end though, Kylo swept Dyarron’s feet out from under him, the impact of his injured head hitting the floor making his whole body lock up in pain and shock. He actually seemed to lose consciousness for a moment, coming to with a low groan.  
  
Kylo stepped closer, swinging his lightsaber with a lazy roll of his wrist, a predator slinking up to his wounded prey. Dyarron shifted to his side, trying to crawl his way to his fallen sword, dragging himself slowly across the floor. Kylo stepped on the tails of his coat, halting his motions, and in response the Knight reached out a hand to try and call the Mandalorian sword to himself. It shuddered and slid a little ways closer, but ultimately stopped too far away to be taken in hand.  
  
And yet, still he did not give up. Lying down on his back again, Dyarron reached into the folds of his ratty coat and pulled out a very rudimentary knife that looked like it was carved from a bone. No doubt it was picked up during his travels for his mission, although Kylo had a feeling it was a prize won by Dyarron’s vice.  
  
“Showing your hand so quickly, Dyarron Ren.” Kylo tutted, kicking the knife from his slack grip. “You really must be concussed.”  
  
The Knight’s slurred response was barely audible. “S’mtimes ye hafta take th’ risk, Master.”  
  
Kylo brought the tip of his saber near Dyarron’s throat, close enough that the hairs on the man’s beard began to singe.  
  
“Was it worth it?”  
  
Dyarron smiled with bloody teeth. “Almost.”  
  
Suddenly his other arm was a blur as Dyarron used his Madalorian steel arm guards to push Kylo’s saber aside and lunged up, aiming to dig another, smaller concealed blade into the flesh of Kylo’s thigh. The Master was quick to see his plan, and even though he was becoming fatigued from the long fight he was nowhere near as handicapped as Dyarron was at the moment. And so he managed to move enough to avoid being stabbed, although not fast enough to avoid being sliced.  
  
He growled in pain, grabbing Dyarron’s hand to keep him from attempting to stab him again. Then, in one swift movement Kylo brought his lightsaber up (a choked protest sounding behind him), deactivated it, and brought the hilt down on Dyarron’s head, completely knocking him out.  
  
Kylo stood, releasing the Knight to collapse fully, breathing heavily, blood oozing lazily from the cut on his leg, the salt from his sweat stinging his eyes. He’d never felt more alive.  
  
“Take him to the medbay.” He addressed the silent crowd behind him, then began walking towards the doors, keeping the limp in his step to a minimum.  
  
“What about you, Master?” Torca called after him.  
  
Without stopping Kylo hissed, “I can tend to my own wounds.”  
  
  
\---------------------------------------------------------------------------------  
  
Tomaxx Ren knew immediately when Supreme Leader Snoke’s life had ended. He’d felt it as one feels the sudden absence of their weapon, dutifully kept at one’s side. The small shock of it, the uncertainty of ‘this can’t be true’, the bereft wariness, the small jolt of vulnerability. And then nothing but calm as reality sank in: He was not defenseless. He did not need the weapon. He will survive. The myriad of uneasy feelings flashed through him in the breadth of a second, but the calm has lasted for days.  
  
He did not want to wait for the inevitable coded message from the First Order telling him what he already knew. He wanted to abort his mission and get back to the Supremacy immediately, knowing he would be needed. The new Supreme Leader would need him. Kylo would need him.  
  
Tomaxx had no doubt in his mind that Kylo had been the one to kill Snoke, as he was probably the only one out of all of them to be able to do it alone. Which is why when the inevitable comm was received he was mildly shocked to hear about the girl. Rey. No last name, only known affiliation was to the Resistance, no known origin. The hazy holo of her made her out to be unassuming and plain, nothing remarkable or powerful about her.  
  
Looks could be very deceiving though, as Tomaxx knew all too well. He wanted to get close enough to this girl to feel her power, to know her signature in the Force. There are many ways to hide one’s true self, but the Force never lies.  
  
The bounty on her head was substantial, understandable given who she’d managed to assassinate, and if Tomaxx wasn’t beholden to his Code he would be tempted to go out and attempt to claim it. As it were, he would not begin to chase unless the new Supreme Leader asked it of him, although Cseenan Ren was by default a much better hunter than any of them.  
  
In a dark cantina that was burrowed in a putrid city slum like a maggot in a festering wound, Tomaxx sat still in his seat, his posture feigning an off-guard air even though he was always ready, always aware. His features were hidden beneath his helmet, and even those details were washed in shadow from the hood of his cloak. It was a risk to appear in the same place more than once wearing his Knight mask, but this was the sort of murky place where one’s identity could not quite be recalled by anyone, should anyone come to ask. There was not one creature in the entire dilapidated ghetto the cantina held itself up in who was not deadly in some way, but Tomaxx drew wariness from even the largest of them.  
  
It was his silence, his calm. The tight control. It’s true that brute fury has it’s place on the hierarchy of deadly actions, but the true king was in controlling one’s aggression.  
  
Tomaxx needn’t look up from his full cup to know his contact had come. He could feel the alien’s presence like tasting a bitter fruit. Tomaxx’s mouth twisted down in one corner, but other than that he made no move to acknowledge the creature that slumped into the seat opposite of him.  
  
“Somethin’ happen?” Ghy said, voice like gravel and the sound slightly distorted from the large tumor growing on one side of his face from his cheek to his collar bone.  
  
Tomaxx gave a slight tilt of his head. “Why do you ask?” He never cared for the way his voice was warped by the mask, but it intimidated most others to his benefit so he tolerated it.  
  
“Never seen the bar look this tense before. You’re throwing bad joojoo all over the place like you got a smoker bug on your back.”  
  
His eyes took in the atmosphere of the locals, noting their rigid postures and the way their eyes seemed to flit over in his direction with no small amount of nervousness.  
  
“An astute observation.” Perhaps his control was not as tight as he thought. He breathed in, trying to find the deep dark calm, the black pond in his mind. Ghy shivered.  
  
“Cold?” Tomaxx asked.  
  
“You gonna drink that?” The other said instead of answering, pointing at Tomaxx’s untouched drink. It had been giving off some kind of fog before, but now it only puffed out little wisps of smoke, like a dying fire.  
  
Wordlessly he passed it across the stained table. Ghy knocked it back in one go, wincing and giving a full body shudder as he swallowed.  
  
“Not supposed to let this one sit for so long.” He said hoarsely. “Ruins the flavor.”  
  
“I think the flavor is horrible either way.”  
  
“Yeah, you’re probably used to finer shit than this, huh?” He eyed the Knight. “First time I met you I thought you come from money. Been wondering for a while jus’ what you are under that scruffy hood, since you sure as kriff ain’t scruffy on the inside. So, what? Your family cut you off from the inheritance? That why you become a killer?” He leaned forward, voice lowering. “That why you’re lookin’ for the _thing?_ Gonna sell it for cash or somethin? Gain back that little taste of the good life?”  
  
Tomaxx ran his thumb over a groove cut into the table, probably by a knife. The stain surrounding it looked vaguely like an upside-down speeder.  
  
“You know we don’t discuss those things, Ghy.” There was no other outward indication that he was irritated aside from a lilt in his voice, but those sitting nearest to their table shifted uncomfortably in their seats. One person got up and moved altogether.  
  
Ghy glanced around, the skin on his arms prickling, his tumor moving slightly as he swallowed thickly. “Yeah, fine. Fine. What’d you want?”  
  
“I’ll be leaving the system soon.”  
  
The creature’s eyes widened slightly. “So something did happen.”  
  
Tomaxx remained silent.  
  
“Don’t try tellin me nothing’s happened. You been breathin’ down my neck, lightin’ fires under my and my people’s asses for weeks, tryin’ to find this thing, tellin me ‘it’s of upmost importance’ n’ shit, and now suddenly you’re takin off without it?”  
  
“You’ll continue to look in my absence. I’ll give you the codes to an encrypted channel where you’ll give me regular updates.”  
  
Ghy sneered. “Oh I will, will I? You ain’t gonna be around no more to tell me what—”  
  
Tomaxx sighed. His hand left the groove and formed a claw, the table jolting slightly as Ghy’s knees banged up beneath, struggling and scratching at his disfigured neck for air.  
  
After a moment when he noticed the bartender beginning to look put-out the Knight relaxed his hand and his hold on the Force, and Ghy slumped over, wheezing.  
  
“Okay, okay.” He coughed. “I will, I’ll do it, okay? _Kriff_.”  
  
Tomaxx nodded. “And as per our agreement, I will of course continue to pay you for your services.” He reached into the folds of his cloak, placing credits and then a data card on the table with care.  
  
“This should cover you for a few months. And this has the codes for my channel. I expect updates by every deadline, as it has been.” Ghy nodded with a jerk, grabbing the items with a quick look around him.  
  
Tomaxx stood, and Ghy flinched, then made a face as if scolding himself.  
  
“Don’t disappoint me, Ghy.” Tomaxx warned, and then made his way to the door. The frozen cantina denizens pointedly looked away from him as he passed, as if in submission to a lord. It created a feeling Tomaxx tried not to dwell on as he left the dingy cantina behind.  
  
He meandered through the ghetto, just one more dark ghost in a broken soul of a city, his random trajectory a conscious decision made out of habit in order to lose any possible tails. He made it back to the junk yard where he’d hidden his ship, boarded, and waited.  
  
When the summons came, Tomaxx had already left the planet’s orbit, impatient to be gone. Impatient to be back.  
  
Tomaxx breathed in deeply as he looked upon the stars streaming him by. He breathed out slowly. The dark tendrils of Snoke had disappeared from where they’d clutched around Tomaxx like a vice, and he felt freer now than he could ever remember. Free and powerful.  
  
He was ready for whatever Kylo Ren had in store for them.  
  
\--------------------------------------------------------  
  
Now Tomaxx Ren watched the Supreme Leader storm out of the training room, the Force like clouds of dark magnetism around him as he went. It drew you in, that kind of power, but it was a thin line to balance on. Too little of it and you end up weaker than those who call on the Light side. Too much of it and it could consume you, destroying your life by turning you into the kind of monster that Snoke had been.  
  
Master Kylo was very strong in the Dark side now. Stronger than he’d ever been before.  
  
Tomaxx had been surprised upon arriving on the _Finalizer_ to feel an almost overwhelming Dark presence. It wasn’t quite as intense as Supreme Leader Snoke’s had been, but it was no less potent.  
  
If Tomaxx could describe the initial feeling, he would have to say it felt like walking into a cloud of noxious fumes. It had penetrated everything, and upon being immersed in it he could feel it seep into him, into his bones, his very soul.  
  
It was a strangely homey feeling after all this time away.  
  
“Shit.” Visser Ren cursed as he stood over Dyarron’s prone form, an electronic sigh filtering from his mask.  
  
“What’s wrong, Viss?” Torca taunted, sauntering over. “Afraid Master Kylo will kill you when it’s your turn?”  
  
“If any of us should be afraid to end up sliced down on the laser-end of his saber,” Cseenan hissed, snapping the butt of his rifle back in place, “It should be you, Torky.”  
  
“Shut up.” She bit back, then turned to Visser. “Can’t you just see his moves before he makes them?”  
  
Visser scoffed. “It doesn’t work that way. You know it doesn’t. Besides, he needs me too much to risk killing me.” He kneeled and put his fingers to Dyarron Ren’s neck.  
  
“Still alive.”  
  
“We’d have felt it if he’d died.” Torca explained, kneeling on Dyarron’s other side, turning his head to get a better look at his wounds.  
  
“Doubt you would’ve.” Cseenan snapped.  
  
“Cseenan.” Tomaxx said with a small amount of warning in his tone.  
  
“_Jewel._” The Barabel hissed back.  
  
Tomaxx wanted to roll his eyes at the old nickname but schooled himself against the urge.  
  
“Just go call for the medic.” He said instead.  
  
Cseenan clicked his teeth together crossly, pointing a claw at Torca. “Why don’t she do it?”  
  
“I could probably just heal him.” She mumbled, still inspecting the gravity of the wounds.  
  
Visser’s head cocked to one side. “Have you managed to make it last?”  
  
She was silent for a moment then, “No,” she grumbled.  
  
“Somehow, Torky,” Cseenan began, twisting another piece of the rifle onto the body of the gun, “You found a way to even fuck up healing. I mean,” he held the rifle up, inspecting the lines of it for accuracy, “How do you make healing un-heal itself, without even trying?”  
  
Torca tensed, her face hidden by her mask but her voice belied her anger. “Well at least I can heal myself enough to stay alive, unlike the rest of you!”  
  
Cseenan’s neck scales bristled. “What’s the point if it rips back open again?”  
  
Zhin-Tok pushed away from the wall where he’d been leaning, quieting Torca’s next reply. They all watched tensely as he walked to the control panel, put something in to the system, and then without saying anything he walked out.  
  
Tomaxx went to follow him after a moment, noting with a passing glance that he’d put a call for a medic.  
  
“Where are you going?” Torca asked, a frown in her voice.  
  
Tomaxx shrugged as he passed her. “You know Master Kylo never sits still long enough for the droids to do their work properly.” They’d all seen the new scar on his face. The exact details of where and when he’d gotten it were still largely unknown, but it wouldn’t have surprised him if it had been at the hands of their old Supreme Leader.  
  
Cseenan barked a mocking laugh. “How _compassionate_ of you, Tomaxx.”  
  
Tomaxx gave him a warning shake of his head that Cseenan returned with a challenging sharp grin.  
  
In truth, their Master’s lack of patience with the medic droids was not the only reason Tomaxx felt the need to check on him. While the Supreme Leader had been dueling with Dyarron, Tomaxx had been distracted from his ministrations by a strange ripple in the Force. It had been light, like seeing the effects of a weak breeze in one’s peripherals without actually feeling it, but it had been _something_.  
  
And his Master had certainly been distracted by _something_. Otherwise Dyarron would not have had the opportunities to strike on the offensive the way he had. To Tomaxx it had almost felt like something had been caught, tangled in the spider’s web of the Force that connected them all together. The lines of web had trembled ever so slightly, almost imperceptibly, but Tomaxx’s Force senses were strong. Stronger than ever before.  
  
Still, he frowned as he made his way to where he could sense his Master had gone. It had been so small a feeling that it may well have just been a blip in space. Perhaps Master Kylo had been able to sense it to a greater extent, his abilities far more attuned than any of theirs. If it was something worth investigation, his Master would tell them.  
  
_Perhaps it was a vision_, He pondered. It had certainly felt similar to the small jolts and undulations of the Force that occur when any of them have visions. Had their Master seen something from the future? Or perhaps from the great Darth Vader?  
  
Master Kylo had mostly kept his visions from Darth Vader to himself, the personal quality affording him to keep secret what they held. But he had, on occasion, told Tomaxx the things he’d been shown. Promises of power, of prestige. Tomaxx understood the temptation, the draw of what they were. Kylo wasn’t the only one born with royal blood.  
  
The door to the sector’s medbay slid open as he approached, Master Kylo’s head jerking up where he’d been watching the droid clean his wound.  
  
His expression soured only slightly at the sight of the Knight, but some of the tension in his shoulders went.  
  
“_I don’t recall asking for any assistance, Tomaxx_.” The sound of Tomaxx’s native language made him freeze for a moment, his mind half a second behind interpreting it. He hadn’t heard Cheunh in over a year. It felt like a second homecoming.  
  
It was only the space of a breath before Tomaxx gathered himself and deftly replied, “_I don’t recall offering any._” The words felt foreign in his mouth, and he found himself pressing his tongue to the back of his teeth.  
  
“_Then why are you here?_”  
  
Tomaxx waved away the other medidroid that had approached beeping an inquiring intonation.  
  
“_Is there something so suspicious about an apprentice looking after his Master?_”  
  
Master Kylo gave him a blank look. “_The compassion is suspicious._”  
  
Tomaxx huffed out a dry laugh. “_You’re the second one to accuse me of compassion today._”  
  
“_Do you deny it?_”  
  
“_Of course. I can prioritize the wellbeing of my Master without resorting to compassion_.”  
  
They looked at each other for a moment, Tomaxx behind his mask of metal and Kylo behind his mask of flesh. Then the Master nodded, focusing his attention back on the droid dutifully applying a bacta patch to his wound.  
  
Taking it as an assent of sorts, Tomaxx removed his helmet, noting a further release of tension from Kylo’s body as he did.  
  
An easy silence stretched between them as Tomaxx relieved the droid of it’s duty and took over applying the bacta to Kylo’s wound. Dyarron never appeared so he concluded the Knight must have been brought to the larger facility a few floors above.  
  
“_Dyarron Ren fought well today_.” The Chiss said, probing.  
  
“_He did_.” The Master agreed.  
  
Tomaxx continued, slowly wrapping a band of gauze around Kylo’s thigh to keep the patch in place. “_His use of the sword has transformed since last year. He must have been training hard, to have the upper hand the way he did_.” He snuck a glance at the seated man, who was frowning deeply at his handiwork.  
  
“_One would hope you all had continued training on your own even without proper guidance._”  
  
Tomaxx nodded. “_I believe we all have. But there’s nothing that can replace the precise guidance from a skilled Master._”  
  
Kylo leaned back in his seat, a gleam in his dark eyes. “_Sometimes we push ourselves further than anyone else can._”  
  
“_And do you think Dyarron has pushed himself further than you are able to? He almost beat you today_.”  
  
There was a dark undertone to Kylo’s chuff of a laugh. “_Are you worried that someone else will defeat me before you, Tomaxx Ren?_”  
  
Tomaxx’s mouth twitched into a small humorless smile. “_Defeating you has never been a goal of mine, Master._”  
  
“_Even when Snoke challenged you to try?_” Kylo’s stare was hard, but Tomaxx knew there was a whisper of betrayal beneath his feelings of anger. This was something they had never had the freedom to talk about; the way they’d been forced to attack and defeat one another for the sake of their training. To question Snoke’s methods was too dangerous a thing—it showed a lack of faith in Snoke himself, who did not take such things well at all— so they’d gritted their teeth and sacrificed the camaraderie and trust they’d developed while under Skywalker’s tutelage for the promise of more power and glory than they could comprehend.  
  
Tomaxx knew it was a dangerous thing to suddenly have allies turned into adversaries, all living and training together so closely. They’d each taken the sudden change in their relationships to each other differently, but Tomaxx knew then as he knew now that his connection to Kylo— and more importantly, Kylo’s trust in said connection’s durability— was more important than Snoke’s want for them to gain strength through constantly challenging each other.  
  
That wasn’t to say that Tomaxx completely eschewed Snoke’s commands to fight his fellow Knights. The Chiss did, with relish at times, enjoying the practice and the reward of beating the others in duels.  
  
But Kylo was the only one he strategically lost to.  
  
A particular memory came to mind. They’d been training for almost twenty-four hours, the grueling physical and mental work treating them like metal being thrust from fire to water and back again— it would either strengthen them or break them into brittle pieces.  
  
By near the end of it Tomaxx’s attentions had narrowed down to only the barest of details: The flash of red sabers, the splatter of red and blue blood. Ragged breaths and dripping sweat. Snoke’s cruel and critical eyes, ever watchful of their every action, his raspy voice commanding them _‘Again. Get up. Again.’_  
  
Tomaxx got the upper hand after a series of calculated moves, and he knew with one downward hit he could have sliced into Kylo and killed him in an instant. Snoke was watching, his dark tendrils tightening around them, into their minds, whispering, _kill him, do it now_, and Tomaxx knew he could not think. He could not let his thoughts flinch at the idea. He had long been trained of his weaknesses in battle, his tells and his mistakes, but it took no thought at all to go back into the wrong muscle memory, causing his footing to be just a bit too open, his balance just a bit too unsteady, and he saw the second Kylo’s eyes lit up with dark triumph at the opening. It was just a few decisive moves on the Master of Knight’s part to slice into Tomaxx’s side (not too deep, nothing terminal) and sweep his legs out from beneath him, the tip of his saber burning a hole in the dark uniform over his sternum, prompting Tomaxx to yield hoarsely.  
  
The pain in his side was nothing compared to the electric punishment he received from Snoke for his mistakes. ‘_I thought you’d overcome such amateur fighting, Tomaxx Ren. My disappointment cannot be understated.’ _  
  
He’d told himself the torture was worth it.  
  
Back in the medbay Tomaxx breathed evenly, his eyes never leaving Kylo’s glare. “_I was not as compliant to his orders as one would think._”  
  
Whether Kylo knew of Tomaxx’s past deceptions or not, his face remained stony. Perhaps it was too soon to talk of such things.  
  
Tomaxx continued, deciding to go back to his original comment, finishing up with the gauze as he did. “_Dyarron fought well today, but I believe he normally would not have gotten so many advantages._”  
  
Kylo’s eyes narrowed. “_Why is that?_”  
  
“_You seemed somewhat distracted today, Master._” It was an opening for Kylo to say anything about the strange tug in the Force that had kept him from claiming victory over Dyarron much sooner.  
  
“Distracted?” Kylo said in Common, as if checking to make sure he interpreted correctly. As if he wasn’t fluent in Cheunh already— another thing he’d hated about himself (and Tomaxx, when they’d first met at the Temple; he’d thought Ben Solo would hate him forever in the beginning) because it was another part of himself learned from his father.  
  
“Yes, distracted.”  
  
In fact, Kylo had seemed distracted since Tomaxx had arrived on the _Finalizer_. He kept his emotions locked away behind the durasteel walls of his mind, but Tomaxx could sense that something was different. There was an imbalance to him now, more than ever, and being near him felt like being in a pitch black cave and sensing a giant gaping maw opened in the ground before you, without actually seeing it. It felt like one step further would have you plunging into an abyss. It was disorienting.  
  
Whatever had opened that hole in him, Kylo seemed determined to act like nothing was amiss.  
  
“I’m not _distracted_.” He spat it like it was an insult. There was a warning in the tense way he held himself now and in the sharpness of his glare. Tomaxx made no other move but he mentally noted that Kylo’s saber was still clipped to his belt, and realized that for the first time in a long while he needed to tread lightly around the other man. He wasn’t sure where they stood anymore, and it left him feeling….unsteady.  
  
He found himself trying to appease the bristling man, his mind supplying him with the words he knew would work. “Then your training practices are quite cunning, Master, to feign an opening in order to see how Dyarron would react to it. Did he take advantage the way you expected him to?”  
  
Kylo’s features twitched into a contemplative frown for only a moment before his resolve hardened, confidence in his nod. “Yes, he did. But it wasn’t enough, evidently.”  
  
Tomaxx nodded back, schooling himself as if he was satisfied with his Master’s answer.  
  
It was disappointing that Kylo did not seem to trust him anymore, but Tomaxx tamped the feeling down. He understood why, all things considered. They’d all been separated for over a year, and in that time Kylo Ren had been obviously been put through many trials. Tomaxx was frustrated that all of his past efforts to secure Kylo’s confidence had turned moot, but he knew with time he could secure them once again.  
  
He had to.  
  
\---------------------------------------------------------------------------------  
  
It was later the next day that cracks began to deepen. Tomaxx, Visser, Cseenan, Zhin-Tok, and a partially healed Dyarron Ren were gathered in the training room, tending to their weapons.  
  
“You guys notice the way they were acting before?” Cseenan hissed.  
  
Earlier they had been summoned to the archive room, to finally begin studying the Sith texts, and upon entering the room they’d fallen silent from their conversation at the sight of Torca and Master Kylo, a little_ close_ and the atmosphere of the room a little _tense_.   
  
“Definitely caught them in the tail-end of an ‘intimate’ moment.” Dyarron agreed, sliding the sharpening flint down the edge of his blade for the upteenth time, his fingers black with oil.  
  
“Could practically smell the way Torca’s in heat for him.” Cseenan growled. “Not to mention he’s always had a soft-spot for her.”  
  
“Not sure I’d call it _soft_ what he has for her.” Visser leered with a toothy grin.  
  
Dyarron paused halfway down his sword again. “Didn’t they kiss once at the Temple? When we played that game?”  
  
“Yeah, and Visser had to kiss Evin?” Cseenan rasped with a sneer.  
  
Visser scowled. “I don’t remember that.”  
  
“No,” Tomaxx said, shaking his head. They looked at him, frowning, and he continued, “It wasn’t Torca he kissed. It was Peoni.”  
  
They were silent as the memory became clear.  
  
“….right.” Visser mumbled.  
  
“Torca refused to play.”  
  
“Nah, I think it was the others who wouldn’t let her play.” Dyarron said, resuming.  
  
Visser shrugged dismissively. “She was too young anyways.”  
  
Tomaxx gave him a look. “We were all young.”  
  
“Not as young as her. She was, what? Fifteen? The youngest out of all of us.”  
  
“The weakest, too.” Cseenan hissed.  
  
Visser ignited his plasma mace, inspecting it thoughtfully. “She’s always been weak in the Force. I still don’t know how she survived Snoke’s training.”  
  
“Pain is a powerful motivator,” Tomaxx replied, “And a powerful source of strength for the Dark side, as we all know.”  
  
Cseenan peered over. “So she still does that thing with—“  
  
“Yes.”  
  
The Barabel’s countenance shifted into something devious, his eyes glittering with a sinister ebony.  
  
“I wonder if she’d have the spine to do it during training.”  
  
Dyarron folded his thick arms. “So far we haven’t done anything to need the Force enough for her to do something like that.”  
  
Visser’s face took on the same leering quality as Cseenan’s. “Then maybe we should change that.”  
  
“Master Kylo won’t like it.” Tomaxx argued.  
  
Cseenan’s neck scales bristled. “You gonna squeal on us, Jewel?”  
  
The Chiss didn’t answer, something calculating in his eyes before he finally answered, “No.” Adding after a moment, “But my statement still stands.”  
  
“And so does ours.” Visser countered. “He’s got compassion for Torca. Always has, hidden deep down inside. We’d be doing him a disservice if we didn’t help him see it so he can snuff it out before it becomes a real weakness.”  
  
Zhin-Tok, who had been silently sharpening his vibro-arbir blades up until now finally spoke up. “We can’t have a weak Master.”  
  
The threat was clear in his almond-shaped eyes.  
  
Tomaxx’s face showed no emotion, his glowing red eyes unreadable. “No, we can’t.”  
  
The Barabel’s sharp teeth glinted hungrily. “I have an idea.”  
  
  
\---------------------------------------------------------------------------------  
  
Kylo and Tomaxx made their way to the training room just having finished up another meeting with the CSA liaisons. He was in no better mood for it, but had found himself more distracted this time around than the first. His thoughts kept creeping back to Torca Ren, and the things she’d told him when they’d found themselves alone in the archive room earlier before the others had joined.  
  
  
_ Kylo looked up from the archive he had been perusing, frowning at Torca as she sifted through the files next to him. It was the first time he’d had the chance to really look at the changes she’d made to herself (and the changes done to her) since he’d last seen her over a year ago. Granted, she’s been on the ship and training with him and the Knights for about a week now, but they hadn’t had even a minute by themselves for Kylo to scrutinize her at any length. Not without the others noticing, at least. _  
  
_ She’d never been a full-bodied woman before (she’d hardly been a woman at all, really, just a girl before her training forced her to grow up), but she’d never been this gaunt either. Her ears sported several piercings, a couple of which looked brand new by the angry redness around them. The shaved sides of her head made her seem even thinner, and the bright colors of her hair were in stark relief against the paleness of her skin. _  
  
_ It was the flash of color that drew his gaze.  
  
__ “You dyed your hair.” He’s not sure why he said it, what prompted the sudden statement. He felt slightly foolish, but something about it bothered him more than it had when he’d first seen her in the conference room where they’d uttered their oaths. _  
  
_ She nodded and peered at him cautiously. “I did.” He tried to seem nonchalant with his reading again, angry at himself for saying anything. There was a minute or two of silence between them before she spoke up again. “I had a feeling you’d say something about it.”_  
  
_ He looked up and frowned. “Why?”_  
  
_ She shrugged._  
  
_ “You and Snoke were always so strict about our uniforms—keeping a tight leash on our ‘propensity for individuality’.” His face darkened and she held up her hands. “Look, I get it, alright? Building a team was more important than cultivating our own sense of selves. But even before all that,” her voice hesitated and lowered, “you always said my hair reminded you of someone. If I wore it up a certain way you’d get a funny look and stare at me.” She glanced at him, brows drawn together. “Don’t you remember?” Before he could answer she looked away, grumbling. “You never did tell me who it was I reminded you of.”_  
  
_ “I don’t remember that.” He said, frown deepening with his confusion._  
  
_ Torca blinked._  
  
_ “You mentioned it more than once at the…before. And then after, you just…stopped mentioning it, and things got so intense under Snoke, that I forgot too.” Her gaze took on a long stare. “I’ve forgotten a lot of things from back then.” _  
  
_ The line between his brows deepened. “Forgot things? Forgot what?”_  
  
_ She gave a humorless huff of a laugh. “That’s the fucking insane thing: I don’t know. I just started realizing that there’s blank spots in my mind—places where I know there’s supposed to be a memory or a thought or just…something. But there’s not. I only just recently remembered the hair thing, but all the others are just faint outlines of memories. Or just gone.” _  
  
_ They were both silent after that, Kylo mulling over what she’d said and what it could mean, and Torca becoming stiff and angry and nervous as she wrestled with her thoughts. Finally she turned to him fully, eyes blazing, hands gripped in tight fists. _  
  
_ “Kylo.”_  
  
_ He turned to her to scold her for dropping his title, but her next words halted him._  
  
_ “I’m glad you killed Snoke.”_  
  
_ Kylo froze, voice low._  
  
_ “Don’t say such things.”_  
  
_ “I am. Why shouldn’t I be? You said it yourself that he was too weak to be our Master anymore.” Kylo didn’t reply, becoming lost in the memory of that day in the throne room. Remembering how he’d decided the second he and Rey had their vision that he was going to kill Snoke. Weakness had nothing to do with it, unless he counted his own._  
  
_ Torca continued, pulling him from his thoughts. “I could feel it when he died, you know. It was like…it was like before he was gone I had something wrapped around my ribs, squeezing me, making me have to fight to get air, and then suddenly it was gone and I could take in a deep breath for the first time in a very long time.” As if to prove it she took in a deep breath, letting it out slowly, her eyes fluttering closed. _  
  
_ "It’s been unsettling. The quiet in my head, I mean. He’s always been there ever since we came with you to serve him after we burned the temple.” She rubbed her head, mussing up her hair. “Now I can think without worrying how my thoughts will get myself punished.”_  
  
_ His eyes flashed as he peered at her sideways. “What sort of thoughts have you been having?”_  
  
_ She gave another humorless laugh, leaning her hip against the table as she turned to face him. _  
  
_ “Thoughts you’d probably punish me for, too.” _  
  
_ Whatever this was, a test of his authority or of their past camaraderie (no matter how tainted and illformed), Kylo decided he wasn’t going to indulge Torca. She was searching for validation and acceptance, but she was his apprentice now. He needed to be strict. He needed to be strong. _  
  
_ His eyes became hard as he warned her lowly, “Then perhaps you should control them better, so I won’t have to.” _  
  
_ Her expression closed up quickly as she took in the seriousness of his threat. She searched his eyes for a moment longer and then lowered her gaze, nodding, her aura prickly, yet contrite. _  
  
_ “Fine.” _  
  
_ “And don’t tell anyone else about what you remembered. That was from a different life— those people are dead now, Torca. You would do well not to dwell on the past.”_  
  
_ She shrugged, grumbling and turning away, “Sure, whatever.”_  
  
_ Kylo’s temper flared and he grabbed her chin, wrenching her face around to look at him. His fingers dug into her jaw when she tried to pull away._  
  
_ “I mean it, Torca.” He growled. _  
  
_ She breathed through flared nostrils, eyes bright with anger and fear and something else he wouldn’t dwell on. _  
  
_ “Yes, Master.” She hissed through clenched teeth. Kylo glared down at her a moment longer before dropping his hand. She stood tensely for a moment, waiting for something, but Kylo merely turned back to the text before him, ignoring her. _  
  
_ As the door slid open she picked up her helmet and put it on with jerking motions, her mental shields going up to hide her tumultuous emotions from the other Knights joining them._  
  
~Now~  
  
Kylo had told Torca to forget whatever she’d remembered, but now that she’d said it he couldn’t seem to even remember anything about his thoughts on her hair from before. And that angered him, because it either meant she was lying and trying to make him doubt his own mind, or his memory was not the durasteel trap he knew it to be.  
  
Or, very likely, she was just misremembering. There’d been more than one time that she’d talked about something happening that none of them could remember, and Snoke had many times punished her in the beginning for adamantly arguing one point or another. Even at the temple she’d been something of a scatterbrain, not quite able to reach the same level as everyone else in their meditation practices.  
  
_She’s mistaken_, Kylo decided. _Any holes in her memory are ones made of her own imagination. And any memories she claims to have of that time…are wrong._  
  
The door to the training room slid open and they were met with darkness and the sound of a loud struggle. Kylo heard Tomaxx take in a sharp breath, his Chiss eyes able to see into the pitch black far better than any human’s.  
  
Kylo hit the light switch panel to his left, and then froze at the sight before him.  
  
Visser and Dyarron Ren were sitting and leaning against the left-side wall, masks on in order to use the night vision to watch the scuffle taking place on the floor. The masked Knights turned to look at Kylo as he entered, but he ignored them as he tried to interpret what was going on.  
  
Cseenan Ren had Torca in a full body grip on the ground, legs wrapped around hers to keep her from kicking, arms around her torso and arms. She was struggling, yelling for him to let her go, her voice reaching a screeching crescendo as he flicked out his tongue and slid it up her neck to her ear.  
  
“ENOUGH!” Kylo bellowed, and Cseenan released her. Torca immediately elbowed him in the gut, twisting to land a few punches to his grinning face before he snapped toothily at her hand and forced her to move back and away lest she lose her appendage.  
  
She wiped her neck and ear as she stood, her seething glare hot enough to burn through durasteel.  
  
“You do that again and I’ll fucking kill you.” She spat, voice hoarse.  
  
Cseenan stood also, dusting himself off nonchalantly. “You’re really no fun today. You bleeding from your slit, Torca?”  
  
Her knife came out, pointing at his abdomen. “I’ll cut you a _bleeding slit_, you shor—“  
  
“Enough!” Kylo repeated, cutting off what would have started an even bloodier fight with the Barabel as he walked up to the two.  
  
Torca lifted her knife to point at Cseenan’s head. “He ambushed me, took my helmet off and then the lights went out, and he fucking hunted me around the room like a goddamn ship rat while they,” she pointed at the others, “stood by and did nothing.”  
  
Cseenan shrugged. “Just wanted to see if you could survive in the deep-dark, Torc. But your Force-feelies are still a little too weak for that I guess.”  
  
Torca lunged at him and Kylo grabbed her forearm, stopping her.  
  
He looked around at the bystanders. “And you? You two watched this?”  
  
Dyarron stood from where he had leaned heavily against the wall, his body still recovering from their duel. “Aye, we had a wager going.” He looked at Visser. “I guess we’ll never know who would’a won.”  
  
“I still think it would’ve been Torca.” Visser droned, giving a metallic sigh through his mask.  
  
“Quiet,” Kylo warned, and the room was silenced but for Torca’s heavy breathing.  
  
“You all were on your own for far too long.” Kylo said, looking at each of them. “You’ve forgotten that we’re supposed to be a team—a unified front. How are we to trust each other if you do _childish_ things like this?”  
  
“A team is only as strong as it’s weakest member.” Cseenan hissed. “I was just seeing how weak we’ve become.”  
  
Torca growled, gritting her teeth furiously. “Put me in my ship and I’ll fly circles around you before I blast your scaly hide out of existence.”   
  
“No one doubts your piloting skills, Torca.” Tomaxx said from where he stood near Kylo now.  
  
“Because she’s the best pilot out of all of you.” Kylo said, then met her blazing gaze. “Even in spite of her weaker Force abilities.” He went back to looking at all of them when her eyes flickered away, anger and shame in the flare of her nostrils.  
  
“Might I also remind you all that none of you succeeded on your missions. _None of you_. Snoke would not have been so lenient about that. Your failures would have been met with severe punishment, would have been seen as a weakness to your characters, but I choose to focus on what we will accomplish together in the future instead of the past.”   
  
Kylo knew what each of them brought to the table, and as a unit they were extremely deadly and efficient. Apparently they needed to be reminded of this.  
  
“We are all that’s left of those who have been trained in the ways of the Force in the entire galaxy. The seven of us. If we can’t work together, all of our struggles, all of our sacrifices, will have been for _nothing_.” His voice rose to a shout. “_NOTHING!_”  
  
Their grave and haunted expressions told him they understood all too well what struggles and sacrifices they’d made to get where they are. To have it all be pointless wasn’t something they wanted to consider.  
  
“If we want to bring order to the galaxy, we have to start here, now, with us. We will not become stronger by preying on each other’s weaknesses anymore. Am I making myself clear?”  
  
“It’s the way of the Sith to exploit the weaknesses of others.” Cseenan hissed.  
  
Kylo ground his teeth. “The Sith are _dead_ because of it. They couldn’t learn to work together and after thousands of years of pulling each other down they were defeated. We will not suffer the same fate. We will evolve to survive. Understood?”  
  
In unison they replied, “Yes, Master.”  
  
“Good.”  
  
The door slid open as Zhin-Tok Ren walked in. He halted at the threshold, observing with keen eyes and senses the state of the room and the atmosphere. A wave of resentment and annoyance flared around Visser before he looked to the floor and the emotions disappeared behind his mental wall.  
  
Kylo’s lip curled at the black-haired Knight. “Why are you late?”  
  
Zhin-Tok raised his fist, in which his twin vibro-arbir blades were clutched.  
  
“I was retrieving my weapons from my quarters.”  
  
Kylo felt around in the Force for any indication that the man was lying, but he had his mental shields up and the only thing Kylo could sense was dark calm.  
  
After a moment Kylo unclenched his jaw. “Don’t be late again.”  
  
Zhin-Tok bowed his head. “Yes, Master.”  
  
“Now enough of this nonsense.” Kylo grumbled darkly. “Let’s begin.”  
  
  
\---------------------------------------------------------------------------------  
  
There was a deep ache in the young Supreme Leader’s muscles, tendons, and joints as he undressed in his rooms after another day of hard training with the Knights.  
  
Wanting to prove herself worthy after Cseenan’s attempt to prove otherwise, Torca had all but monopolized Kylo’s sparring time for the past two days. Wanting to see just how far she was able to go, he had not gone easy on her. She was currently lying unconscious in a medbay, wrapped in bacta. But Kylo was pleasantly surprised with how much she had been able to endure. She’d lasted far longer than Dyarron, and with graver injuries.  
  
Then again, she was used to fighting with wounds, having found out the best booster for the Dark Side had been through pain. Most of her scars were self inflicted during various battles in order to have access to greater power. The only reason she hadn’t inadvertently killed herself through her various cuttings has been due to her ability to use the Dark Side to heal the worst of them, although they never quite healed correctly.  
  
More than once she’d managed to close up a laceration on her side or leg, only for the skin to tear again like wet flimsy at the slightest movement, agony renewed. At this point she hardly screams when it happens anymore. They’re just more scars for her collection.  
  
Physically she was strong, mentally she was even stronger, but Force-wise, she was the weakest out of all of them. Kylo knew that if he hadn’t killed Snoke, the old Master would have culled Torca eventually. But Kylo knew that she just needed more training. She needed different training. He would help her where Snoke could not.  
  
Kylo was mentally cataloguing the progress of his Knights and planning for the next step in their instruction when, just as he was pulling his surcoat over his head, he felt the pull of the Force suck all of the sound from his immediate area. He felt his jaw clench, letting the garment fall in a heap on the floor, slightly annoyed that the Force seemed to always try and connect him with Rey whenever they were the most indisposed. But, he reasoned, at least he had his long sleeved undershirt on— even though he rather enjoyed the affect his naked torso seemed to have on the young woman.  
  
No matter. This wasn’t the time for that. Training plans segregated to the back of his mind, Kylo refocused on the fact that he and Rey had a lot to talk about concerning recent events in their connection. Namely, the fact that she’d managed to reach out to him two days prior through the bond even though somehow he had a feeling it had been an accident.  
  
They probably wouldn’t talk about the other night. Which was probably for the best, since he wasn’t sure yet how to excuse his behavior.  
  
_He felt the connection thrum to life as he sat hunched over his desk. He confirmed that Rey was once again asleep on his bed and then he turned back to his work decisively, willing to ignore her presence until the connection closed again. But the more he tried to concentrate on his work the more he just couldn’t. She was like a pulsing beacon at his back, ruffling the minute hairs and microscopic nerves on his body without even knowing she was doing it. _  
  
_ He rubbed at his eyes, sitting back with a defeated sigh. The past two days had been full of meeting with the CSA, dueling with Dyarron, recovering from the mental strain brought on by Rey’s rude departure, studying the Sith texts, and then dealing yesterday with the scuffle between Cseenan and Torca before more dueling. Just those two days felt impossibly long. He was tired. Exhausted. He looked over at the bed, then away. He could sleep on the couch in the other room. It would be the proper thing to do. No doubt a part of her was still angry at him for their argument the other day, and a part of him was still seething about how she continued to reject his offer to train her. _  
  
_ But he was tired of holding himself above everyone. Tired of having to constantly be on guard, constantly keeping his walls up to protect himself. Tired of conflict. He just wanted to connect, to be vulnerable with someone who was just as defenseless as he. _  
  
_ So he shut off his datapad, turned down the lights, and climbed slowly onto his bed, settling stiffly on his back, with an inch or two between his body and Rey’s. Hearing her softly breathing, feeling the radiant warmth from her presence seep into his side, and just seeing her curled so relaxed in sleep was enough to ease the tension in his muscles and allow him to drift into a foggy slumber._  
  
_ Emerging out of that fog to find himself with scant **atoms** between their bodies, and then physically pulling her closer when she grumbled about timing was something he had not planned for. But the absolute rightness of feeling her so close was a balm to the ache he didn’t realize he’d had in his chest. It had taken him no time at all to drift back into unconsciousness._  
  
It wasn’t until the morning when he was eating breakfast that he remembered what he’d done, and the mortification was enough to spoil his appetite.  
  
Now, almost twenty-four hours later, Kylo sighed, deciding to just get this over with. He turned, expecting to see Rey standing behind him, or perhaps lying in bed due to the very late (or very early) hour. He expected righteous indignation or at least an attempt to slap him for his gall. Instead his eyes were drawn downwards, to where she was sat leaning against the side of his bed frame.  
  
He opened his mouth to ask what the kriff she was doing on the floor when she shifted slightly and he froze. Finally noticing he was there, she drew her legs up quickly, trying to conceal what he’d seen but it was too late.  
  
They regarded each other, her with eyes that reflected a myriad of emotions—surprise, frustration, vulnerability, and something wild and tense like a cornered animal—and he with his no doubt more serious gaze.  
  
“What happened?” He breathed.  
  
Her mouth formed a thin line and she trained her eyes ahead, pointedly not looking at him. In spite of her attempts to appear strong Kylo could see a trembling in the set of her face, and sense an inner turmoil she wasn’t trained enough to completely hide yet.  
  
Something inside him flared hotly at her silent treatment, unused to being openly snubbed after dealing with so many subordinates kowtowing to him lately. But he released his clenched fists after a short moment, forcing the anger to the back of his mind.  
  
“Rey,” He said more vigorously, wishing more than ever he could influence her with the Force to speak. “Why are you in handcuffs?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I apologize for how jumpy in time the end became. I smoothed it out as best I could and my beta reader assured me it was fine (compared to how it was in the first draft), but please let me know if it's still difficult to keep up with.


	7. Hell Hath No Fury

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter is a bit shorter than my previous ones, but after discussing it with my beta, it was decided not to include some of the other things I had planned. Those will most likely be in the next chapter.
> 
> *****Trigger Warning: some graphic depictions of violence, some sexual assault/dubious consent, sexually explicit content, gaslighting.*****

* * *

  
  
Torca Ren was a force to be reckoned with as she made her way like an unhinged bandsaw through the halls of the _Finalizer_. The air crackled like a whip around her, her force powers growing with each agonized step as the wound on her thigh ripped open again with each movement. She channeled the pain, fists tight at her sides, sweat pouring down her face and matting her fiery hair to her head beneath her mask. Her eyes were ablaze, and though many potential targets for her rage passed her by, she had one destination in mind. 

She’d spent the better part of the past four hours fighting Master Kylo after Cseenan and the others had played their stupid games on her._ So fucking stupid_, she thought furiously for the nth time. She’d fought with fervor, wanting to prove her mettle as well as work off the lingering anger she felt towards Kylo after he’d snubbed her in the articles room. _Should have just kept my stupid mouth shut._ The cut on her thigh was not the only one she’d sustained—either from her Master or from herself—but it was the deepest. She would need staples, and it would scar horribly even with bacta applied. 

But she’d already moved well past _Fuck It_ in terms of scarring her body. The little girl who had wanted to keep her skin clean so as to preserve her innocent vanity had died. Torca had surely killed her in that fire at the Temple. Burned her up, like an offering. _Good riddance._ The creature that had emerged from the flames was hideous, but at least it had power. 

_Visser Ren_, she thought his name like a curse, _I’m going to fucking **kill you**._

She nearly shattered the comm monitor beside his door, such was the force with which she pressed for entry.

“Open up, Viss!” She yelled, her voice hoarse even through the mask’s voice modulator. “I know you’re in there!” 

He’d slunk out of the training room an hour after watching her battling with their Master. _Coward,_ she spat. _There’s no escaping this fight._

After the door to his room opened at her continued buzzing Torca shoved at Visser Ren roughly, forcing him back as she threw off her mask and rounded on him.

“You _fucking asshole!_” She shoved him again, incensed by the amused smirk spreading across his handsome face after his initial shock of her assault. “I ought to cut that smile off your fucking face, you kriffing—“ she went to shove him a third time but he easily deflected her arms away and evaded her. 

“Aww, don’t be like that, Torc.” He soothed, the effect diminished by the cruel twist of his lips. 

Torca’s body was tense, trembling in her fury and pain. “Shut up! You—“ she swung at him with her fist, and he blocked her arm with his forearm while coming around with his other fist. She caught his wrist in her hand and then twisted around beneath it to force his arm back in an awkward and painful position, making him go down on one knee to try and alleviate the strain. 

His laughter, edged with pain as it was, made her want to wrench the arm from it’s socket. 

“Alright, Torca, I yield.” 

She pushed his arm up higher, making him grunt and hunch further forward. “What was it Master Kylo had said? ‘No yielding unless you’re dead’?” 

Visser seemed to watch from the corner of his eye as blood dripped to the ground from the cut on her thigh. Her pant leg was soaked with her blood down to her shin. “It really is quite amazing how strong you get when you’re hurt.” He mused.   
  
Torca pulled up on his arm minutely, teeth grit in malicious joy as Visser grunted again, and then released him to catch himself heavily on the floor. 

“You all may spit on me for being weak, but I’ve gotten stronger since last year.” She leaned down into Visser’s face. “Don’t fuck with me.” 

Visser’s eyes lit up as he grinned, and that was the only warning before he punched Torca on her wound. She cried out and stumbled back, gripping her leg as blood flowed anew, allowing Visser to stand. He barely gave her a second to gather herself before he lunged at her. To her credit, she managed to block his fist and land one of her own on his side, and then break his hold on her arm with a kick to his chest that pushed him backwards. 

The blond Knight’s coughing from the blow was half laughter, inciting more rage from Torca. _How fucking **dare** he_. 

She screamed and ran at him, her fist pulled back. Visser caught her, twisting her around and kicking the back of her knee to make her half collapse. She used the momentum to pull the other knight over her shoulder, catapulting him onto his back. She quickly straddled him and threw several punches to his face, blood flying. And still he grinned. 

Torca was knocked forward by his knee, growling as he took a fistful of her blazing hair in hand. He yanked her to the side by his grip on her head and rolled them so he was on top, then hooked his legs beneath hers to hold them immoveable. She hit at him as he grappled with her arms, feeling a small sense of satisfaction when her elbow landed on his jaw soundly. But ultimately the female Knight lost the struggle when Visser was able to trap her arms above her head by the tangle of bracelets and wrappings at her wrists. 

_Shit shit SHIT._

Torca snarled, gnashing her teeth and shaking her head, muscles bulging across her body as she tried to break Visser’s hold on her, trying to pull on the pain radiating from her thigh, trying _anything_ to get him off, to no avail. The moment Visser’s other hand came up to wrap around her throat, she felt herself freeze up. She tried to keep the fury and spitting hatred at the forefront of her mind, tried to keep everything else that threatened to bubble up _down_, but she knew he could sense the sudden vulnerability beneath her facade. She thrashed, but the weight of him on top of her and the vice he had on her neck was enough to let something young and afraid ooze up out of the black. _NO, DAMNIT_. 

“There it is.” Visser murmured in a sing-song voice, breathing heavily, bright blue eyes taking in her sudden change. “There’s the Torca I know.” 

Her throat worked beneath his tightening palm, her breath ragged from their fight and the torment in her leg and the increasing pressure on her windpipe. Visser dug his thumb in, the pain of it forcing her to turn her head with a wince. He leaned down, blowing softly into her ear and chuckling when she tried to jerk away. She felt him stick his nose at the hinge of her jaw and inhale, scenting her sweat and no doubt leaving a smear of blood from his busted upper lip.

“It’s been a long time, hasn’t it, Torc?” He breathed, nuzzling her pulse. “Did you miss me?” 

“No, you piece of shit.” 

Visser made a mock pouty face that Torca wanted to slice off. “Aw, but I missed you. So. much.” He ground his hips down in emphasis, and she shut her eyes against the familiar heat it sparked within her. 

“Fuck you.” She wished more than anything she was capable of spitting venom like a voxyn, or at least shattering eardrums with her scream. It certainly would have helped with Cseenan earlier. How shameful it had been to have Master see her that way. _So weak. So fucking weak._

“Mmmm,” Visser hummed against her throat, “You and your dirty talk.”

Torca began to struggle again, her skin warming where his lips moved against it, “Get the fuck off of me.”   
  
He tutted, shaking his head. “You’re always so antagonistic. We haven’t seen each other in almost a year, you avoid me for days after we all come together again, and this is how you treat me? Even though I brought back some good parts for your ship?” 

Torca finally met his gaze again, her face red with indignation. “You let Cseenan hunt me. You put me at the shit-end of a bet. You _humiliated me_ in front of Master Kylo. _Fuck you_.”

“That was all Cseenan and Zhin-Tok, Torc.” He placated. “And you know how Dyarron loves betting on things. He got me caught up in it, is all. Don’t be such a Loth-cat.” She turned her head away again, breathing loudly through her nose as her anger swirled with something almost contrite. _Dyarron does have a habit of catching people up in his gambling shit._  
  
Visser loosened his grip on her neck, soothing the skin over with his thumb where it had been hurting her before. “You always make things more difficult for yourself. Come on, Torc. We had a great thing going before. Let’s just blow off some of that Lothy attitude like we used to, and then I’ll help you upgrade your ship. Like old times.”

Torca narrowed her eyes and scoffed. “As if I’d trust you anywhere near my ship after what you did.”

The blond man sighed. “Torca, Torca, Torca. How you wound me with your words.” He lowered his voice, the deep cadence like the alluring purr of an engine. Torca wanted to shut her ears to it, knowing how it affected her. 

“Haven’t I always taken care of you? Haven’t I always had your back when the others wanted you gone?”

There was a familiar and sharp pang in her chest at his words. Torca pressed her teeth together until her gums started to ache. 

“Shut up.” 

Visser gave her an almost pitying smile. “Come on, Torca. You know I’m the only one who gives a shit about you anymore.” He paused, as if to allow the truth to sink in. Torca could have burned a hole into the wall with the heat of her glare, her mind a constant stream of _shut up, shut up, shut up,_ but she also knew Visser wasn’t quite lying. 

Her whole life she’d been forgotten or ignored by those around her. Growing up with twelve brothers and sisters would do that, as well as not being particularly strong in the Force.

_Dead. That girl is dead_, She reminded herself. _I’m stronger now. I’ve found my strength in the Dark Side. _

Visser continued, “And if I really thought you needed help fighting Cseenan I would have jumped in, bet or no bet.” 

Torca grumbled, “I doubt that.” But she could feel the uncertainty at her own wrath warring in her chest. 

He tapped her chin and she met his gaze. “No, really,” He urged. “Everyone else might think you’re no good in a fight, but _**I** _know what you’re capable of.”

She wrestled with her thoughts, angry and uncertain and guilty for some reason. Maybe she’d been too hasty to unleash her anger on him. Maybe….

_Wait._

Her temper returning, she thrust her head up to connect her forehead with his nose, then used his sudden lack of attention and wrenched her arms from his lax grip and punched him across the face. He rolled off of her at her shove, first groaning and holding his bleeding nose, then chuckling while she rolled the opposite way and quickly moved into a defensive crouch.

“See?” He smiled through the blood, “Didn’t even see that coming.”

“You never returned my comm.” 

Visser blinked and sat up slowly, his face unreadable. “What comm?”

Torca gave a loud sigh and rolled her eyes, impatient. “In the Atravis sector, your ship came up on my radar. I sent you a comm but you never replied.” 

He laughed, and Torca tensed. “Is that what all this was about? You thought I was in Atravis and didn’t return your comm? Oh, Torca.” He shook his head, patronizing her. 

Torca grit her teeth, standing. “You were there. I saw it. I sent the comm.”

“No, Torca,” he intoned blandly, “I wasn’t. I was on Omwat, in the Garis sector, looking for the kriffing Sith artifact.” He wiped the blood from his upper lip and looked up at Torca with a brow raised. “Sounds like you could really use a console update on your ship if it’s glitching like that.”

“It’s _not_ glitching!” She argued, her voice rising with her frustration, “I don’t know why you’re lying about this. If you didn’t want to return my comm, then fine, just say so. I thought we’d planned to meet—”

Visser stood and cut her off loudly. 

“No, _you_ planned to meet. _I_ never agreed to anything. I don’t even remember having a full conversation about meeting.”

Torca breathed heavily through her nose, searching Visser’s bright blue eyes, searching her memory.

_“Finally free.” He murmured into her ear, an arm slung across her shoulders as they headed to the ship hangar from Snoke’s throne room._

_ “Don’t let Master Snoke hear you.” She murmured back with a dark smile. “Or he’ll flay you.”_

_ “Hmm. Wouldn’t want that, since it would keep me from exploring my favorite part of the galaxy.”_

_ “Oh?” She queried nonchalantly, “And where would that be?”_

_ His breath was hot on the side of her neck as he whispered, “Between your thighs.”_

There was no mistaking it.

“We talked the day we were sent off.” She argued. “We agreed to meet near Nentan, in the Mid Rim. I went there but you never showed. Where were you?”

Visser laughed again, exasperated. “I don’t know what to tell you, Torc. I have no memory of that conversation, and we both know you don’t have the most reliable memory either. Look,” he started, cutting her off again, “just forget it, alright?” He approached her beseechingly, but not without caution. “I’m here now, aren’t I?”

She stood still, letting him approach, letting him put his hands on her arms and slide them up to her tense shoulders. 

“Let’s just forget about it,” he said lowly, his blues eyes piercing hers. 

With an angry growl Torca threw out her arms, breaking his hold. He grabbed at her and she blocked him, then crouched and spun out her leg in an attempt to knock his legs from beneath him. She managed to make him stumble, and her final push with the Force sent him sprawling on his ass again. She straddled him once more, but this time had her vibro-blade in hand and at his throat. Whatever counter-movement he had begun to make was quickly aborted at the imminent threat to his neck.

She leaned down. “I’m getting real tired of being told to forget about things.”

He eyed the weapon in her hand, and then up to catch her gaze with his smoldering eyes. “You are so beautiful when you’re enraged,” he breathed lowly. 

She hissed through her teeth, pressing the blade closer to his skin, close enough to prick and bring up a line of blood. She felt his hands on the backs of her thighs, and she reached up with her free hand to grab a fistful of his silky blond hair, the threat of violence in the twist of her wrist and the snarl on her face. 

Blood pounded in her thigh and chest and increasingly between her legs. His hands squeezed closer to her ass, and then something shifted within her.

“Fuck it,” she snapped, throwing the blade away and using both hands to grip his hair as she forced her lips to his in a bruising kiss. 

“Mmffinally,” He moaned, kissing her back with fervor. His hands kneaded and squeezed her ass and she dropped her weight onto him, feeling the hardening length of his cock trapped at the seam of her thigh. She tightened her grip on his hair, biting his lip and relishing in his wince.

His eyes glowed vindictively, and one hand moved to press his thumb into the wound on her thigh. Her cry of pain was swallowed by another hard kiss, their teeth clicking together from Visser pulling her down by the back of her neck with his other hand.

They rolled, biting, kissing, sucking, not caring about the blood. They pulled on hair, pressed on wounds, consumed each other’s pain and made it into pleasure. 

Clothes barely removed, _‘your scars could send even a Hutt away’,_ they fucked on the durasteel floor. 

Afterwards, when they’d cleaned up (Torca pointedly avoiding Visser’s _“What were **you** doing in the Atravis sector anyways?”_) and gone to the ship bay, and Visser was telling another story from his time slinking around the planets near the Inner Rim that had Torca shaking her head and laughing darkly, she felt stupid about earlier. _Who cares about not meeting at Nentan?_ It was ridiculous of her to let her emotions get the best of her like that. She had better control than that. _So foolish._

Pulled out of her thoughts for another quick quip that had Visser laughing and looking back at her almost _fondly_, she realized she’d missed this camaraderie. 

She’d grown up one of the middle children in a large family, and then she’d lived with others at the Temple, and then with the Knights. Going off on her own to search for the Sith artifacts Supreme Leader Snoke had fervently wanted had been important in many ways concerning her personal strengthening in the Dark Side, and she’d been partly relieved to be off on her own and away from the taunting of the others, but after a small while she’d found herself stricken with a sense of loneliness. 

_So weak. So stupid._

Visser Ren was a flawed man—an incredibly cruel man at times even—but as Torca watched him fit a new motivator into the wire guts of her ship’s control panel, his blond hair framing his handsome face, she knew there were worse things. She told herself she was lucky, even, that Visser had taken her under his wing all that time ago. 

He’d helped her find the backbone to stand in Master Snoke’s presence, swearing her fealty. He’d helped her build her laser whips, and trained with her when the others lost patience. He took her weak childhood innocence and helped her become the strong woman she was today. Even though it had been painful, and terrifying, and made her feel untethered and disgusting at times, she was stronger for it now. 

She was stronger for it now. 

And tomorrow she was going to try and beat Master Kylo in a fight, to prove her strength. To prove her worth. Because like hell was she going to let anyone or anything jeopardize her place in the Knights of Ren. Not even herself. 

* * *

The air was silent of the usual hum of the Finalizer as the Force connection strengthened between the Supreme Leader and the Young Jedi. Kylo was sure that even if a blast canon went off outside his room, neither Force-wielder would flinch. But the silence made the pounding in his chest and the strain in his voice all the more audible.

“_Rey, why are you in handcuffs?_” He asked, looking down at the woman sitting against his bed.

She closed her eyes as if in pain, as if closing them would shut out his words—perhaps make the whole situation go away.

A situation Kylo was completely in the dark about. How had he not felt this? Surely she would have had strong emotions and he would have been alerted through their bond that something had happened. 

He thought she was going to continue to ignore him and he took a few steps closer, his frustration rising with the tightness in his chest. But she finally spoke, her voice quiet and hoarse.

“Please, _please_, don’t do this now, Ben. Just ignore me, pretend I’m not here until the connection ends, or just close it off yourself. I don’t have the strength for it right now.” 

“_What happened?_” He repeated, ignoring her pleas. “Where are you?” 

If she’d somehow been captured by the First Order he would have heard of it by now, which meant if this was what he thought it was, someone was halfway to their goal of collecting on the bounty on Rey’s head. It was only a matter of time until whoever caught her messaged the First Order, in which case he instructed the comms officer to alert him immediately.

He tried to pull on the connection to bring her surroundings into focus, but with a scowl she pushed back, keeping him on his side. Kylo stopped, standing above looking down at her, his frustration mirrored in her own annoyance directed towards him. 

He allowed himself to feel a small amount of hope that he would be seeing her soon, finally, in the flesh. Following on the heels of the hope came thoughts of what he’d do once she was finally in his grasp. He wanted to shove her away in anger as much as he wanted to crush her body to his own, pull her into him and never let her go. 

But the feelings and thoughts lasted only a moment until his suspicion seeped in to take their place. He peered at Rey, going so far as to kneel beside her to view her more closely. 

She leaned away, turning her face away slightly. Trying to hide the obvious bruise forming on her left cheek. 

He looked at the bags beneath her red-rimmed eyes, noted her rumpled tunic and pants, her curious lack of shoes, and caught a glimpse of the binders around her wrists before she pulled her legs up tighter to her chest to hide them. 

“Stop.” She grumbled. “Just go.”

Then it dawned on Kylo, a familiar feeling of ash settling in his stomach where the small light had been suddenly snuffed out.

“You weren’t captured. You’re not on your way here.” His disappointment was palpable. Somehow he was angry again, that somehow Rey had managed to disappoint him again—betray him and escape again, even though she wasn’t any closer to him now than she’d been the minutes and hours and days before now. The small hope had been enough to reopen the gaping wound from that day in Snoke’s throne room. If it had even healed closed at all. 

Rey leaned her head back, looking at the ceiling stoically. But then a noise caused her to jerk in her seat, her head swinging back down, eyes wide as she looked between Kylo and whoever was approaching her.

“Leave.” She hissed. 

“No.” Kylo hissed back, going so far as to touch the tips of his fingers to her exposed arm to keep himself grounded in the connection. A small defiance, but lately he’d been relishing in any way he could prove he was now his own master. She tried to move away, but with a nervous look up at the approaching jailer, stopped fidgeting. 

Too little too late Kylo wondered if whoever was coming would be able to see him. Her surroundings shimmered into hazy view, and Kylo could tell she was in a cell. A male voice echoed murkily through the bond.

“I see you’ve finally woken up. The sedation worked well to settle you down. I must admit I’m a bit surprised you haven’t used your magic tricks to escape, although I think we both know it would have only made things worse for you.”

There was a pause as both of them seemed to be waiting for the man to notice Kylo, but whoever it was he seemed to be none the wiser.

_Interesting._

Rey looked up at the speaker with heated eyes, the flare of her anger like a sharp knife in the bond. Kylo could hear it’s tinny vibrations through the Force like a melody he knew too well, so used to it’s tune in the back of his mind. He wanted to hear more of it from Rey.

“And I think we both know that none of this was necessary.” She replied hotly. “In fact it’s a bit overkill if you ask me, _sir_.” The title was said with spitting vehemence, a mocking of respect. 

Kylo’s frown deepened. He looked to where she was glaring and tried to make out the uniform just barely visible. It was an admiral’s jacket.

His gaze swung back to Rey as the realization finally sunk home. 

“The Resistance has caged you.” His face twisted into a sneer, “Did they finally give in to their fear of you?” And then he stilled, his heart hammering in his chest, suddenly feeling as if he’d missed a step descending a dark stair. “Did they find out about the bond?” 

Rey closed her eyes, the shake of her head barely discernible. The tension in Kylo’s chest lifted somewhat. It shouldn’t matter if they found out about it, if they locked her away for it. He was the most powerful man in the galaxy and nothing could defeat him.

_And yet. _

The admiral scoffed. “It was very necessary. Your little fit caused quite a lot of damage. Keeping you down here is for the safety of everyone else on board at this point.”

“I’m not dangerous.” Rey argued. “I just—“ She gave a frustrated sigh, looking away from both men present. “I just had a _bad dream_.”

“Plenty of soldiers have bad dreams.” The admiral sneered. “It’s part of war. But when they do they don’t go sneaking around stealing supplies like a thief and then attack fellow soldiers when they’re caught. I assumed you were attempting to jump ship but your hysterics speak of another issue entirely.”

Rey put the heels of her hands to her closed eyes, breathing deeply. Regret, shame, anger, mortification, and some aching memory of panic writhed beneath her surface. 

She whispered low enough for the admiral to miss it, her face hidden by her arms and the binders that held them together.

“Please don’t listen anymore. Please go away.” 

He could have just said ‘no’ without any explanation, knowing she wasn’t in any position right now to argue with him without looking truly insane. But he knew what was happening, he’d been through similar situations himself. The distrust, the fear, the whispers of ‘monster’ and ‘freak’ and ‘wrong’ behind thin doors, behind barely concealed glances. The tight embrace of his mother as he shook through his nightmares was more of a prison than a comfort. She had sacrificed her safety for the comfort of the house staff than for any true want to chase his demons away. He knew this now. He also knew he would have given anything to have had anyone by his side—truly on his side—at those times.

“I’m not leaving you alone with him.” Kylo murmured back. 

He felt her surprise, her wariness, her suspicion. But then, ever so nonchalantly, she leaned just a hairs breadth into the touch of his fingertips (prompting him to wrap his hand more securely around her tricep, thumb brushing over the scar on her shoulder, the buzzing connection sending goosebumps down her arm and up his) her hands falling back into her lap almost defeatedly. 

“I’m sorry, Admiral.” She croaked, looking up. “It won’t happen again. I promise I’ll train harder to be better.”

“I doubt that.” The man said with derision. “And do you want to know why, girl?” 

Rey didn’t answer, the fire back in her face and in the way her fists clenched in her lap. Kylo mirrored her frown. Why couldn’t this man just take her apology and be done with this debacle? 

“It’s because I know that you can take a desert rat from Jakku, dress it up, give it some magic tricks and call it a Jedi, but it’s still a desert rat underneath it all.” He leaned closer to the bars, his strict face full of cruelty and wrath. “No matter how hard you try to fool yourself and everyone else, we both know you’ll always be just a filthy scavenger from Jakku.”

The fight left Rey’s body as the words sunk in. 

Kylo remembered the last time she’d looked so dejected, so tired. It’d been when he’d confronted her about her parents in Snoke’s throne room. It had been necessary for her then to be forced to admit the truth she’d hidden away for so long. Kylo felt that it had freed her. She hadn’t needed to seek them out anymore; she could forget them, forget where she came from, and join him. Together they could burn their pasts away along with everything else. 

Or so he had thought.

But this, now, wasn’t for Rey’s benefit. This wasn’t breaking her down to build her back up again. This was just to break her. 

“How long am I to be kept here?” Rey asked quietly.

The admiral sighed scornfully. “Not for too much longer—just until you are determined not to be a danger to the crew or the ship anymore.” The look in his eye said what he really meant—she’d be there until he decided she could be controlled. “I’d keep you until we reached the Inner Rim but I think we both know General Organa will just release you as soon as she gets back.”

Rey glanced at Kylo in her peripherals, her anxiety spiking at all the information being divulged. Kylo took note of it all—they were on their way to somewhere in the Inner Rim, and his mother wasn’t on the ship at the moment for some reason. That explained why Rey was locked up at all. Knowing Leia, she’d have just sent her away on a shuttle ‘for her own good’, although with Luke dead there wasn’t anywhere she could ship her to learn control anymore. Except to him. 

Kylo had a feeling Leia would sooner drive her father’s saber through Rey’s heart than watch her meet her true potential in the Dark Side, the way he did.   
  
The admiral continued, his seething voice grating on Kylo’s nerves. “You would think she’d learn not to put so much affection in another young Force-wielder, having been so devastated by her crazed son’s betrayal, but it seems that some mistakes need to be made more than once for some people to learn from them.”

Kylo tensed, his rage growing. He wanted to show this man just how crazed he really was, preparing to pull on the connection and reveal himself in dramatic fashion before causing chaos in the brig, but Rey stood suddenly, breaking his concentration.

“Don’t you bring Leia or Ben into this.” She spat. “You have no idea what you’re talking about.”

The Admiral looked at her in disgust. “Your continued defense of the man who has slaughtered countless lives and helped bring the galaxy to near ruin only makes me more sure that this is where you belong. So sit down and get comfortable, little scavenger. And perhaps in the meantime you should think about whose side you’re really on here.”

As Rey’s anger fizzled out, Kylo’s resentment grew. The Admiral turned to go, took a few steps, and then turned halfway back, his parting words a signature on his death warrant.

“Out of all the worthy people in the entire galaxy to give such powers to, why did the Force have to choose a nobody like you?”

Rey’s legs folded beneath her as soon as the Admiral was almost gone, and she resumed her seated position from before—only the small furrow between her brows and the hunched angle of her bowed head showing the turmoil of emotions writhing within her.

The Admiral’s ghostly figure disappeared along with Rey’s surroundings as Kylo receded into his anger.  
  
“I’ll kill him.” Kylo seethed. “Rey, tell me where you are and I’ll come and I’ll kill him.” 

She grumbled, “Because you’re the only one allowed to call me a nobody, right?”

His hands clawed at the air as he restrained himself from grabbing her and shaking his frustrations out, growling in his efforts.“You are the most—_stubborn girl_ I’ve ever known!” His fist met the frame of his bed instead, and he welcomed the sharp pain. She flinched, but did not move at all otherwise. His hands fell to fist on his thighs. “Are you this obtuse usually, or is just the things that I say that seem to pass right through you? Are you even listening to me right now?”

Rey breathed out a long sigh, sagging into the wall/bed frame at her back. 

“Yes, I’m listening. I don’t understand why you’re so upset. Isn’t this what you wanted?” She held up her bindings. “To see me bound and ridiculed? Are you satisfied with my humiliation, or would you care to stick around to see if he comes back with something else?”

Her gaze was challenging but tired. She was still embarrassed that he’d heard so much about her apparent breakdown, and Kylo leaned back on his haunches, unable to think of what to say. 

After a moment he settled into a more comfortable seated position beside her, leaving half a foot of space between them. He looked to his door and with a flick of his fingers double-checked it was locked, even for service droids. He didn’t want to have to explain why he was sitting on the floor of his room like this.

He eyed her bindings, noting the rather old device would have been childsplay to get out of had he been the one bound. He was sure she could get out of them too, especially after having witnessed her Force powers first-hand.

“Why haven’t you taken them off?” He asked, looking pointedly at the cuffs.

Rey gave him a dirty look after following his gaze. “Does it look like I have the key?”

Kylo scowled, matching her tone. “Did it sound like I was implying you had one?”

“Well I don’t know how you expect me to be able to get out of locked wrist bindings without one,” she seethed back, “unless you think I have some sort of special scavenger lock-pick hidden on my body somewhere.” 

Kylo scoffed. “No, but I'm starting to think you wouldn’t use it even if you had it, just to spite me.”

“Oh?” She laughed without humor. “To spite _you?_ I’d have to actually care about your opinion in order to spite you.” 

He ignored the small stab in his chest at her heartless comment, his anger rising to cover it. “So then you’re just afraid,” he spat.

“Afraid?” She repeated, her face red. “Afraid of what? Of making my situation worse? Of giving the Admiral more reasons to keep me locked away?” 

“No, you obtuse girl,” Kylo snarled, “You’re afraid of actually finding out how far your powers can take you. You’re afraid to show them just how powerful you are, how powerless they are to stop you.” 

She grit her teeth. “I’m _not afraid_.” 

Kylo fixed her with a challenging glare. “_Then unlock the bindings._” 

“_No._” She ground back.

“Rey—“

“I said ‘NO’.” She hissed. “Or were you not listening?”

Kylo tried to take deep breaths to hold back the angry words rising within him. He and Rey had leaned in close to each other far enough that he could see all of the small freckles on the bridge of her nose. Focusing on them helped him bite his tongue, but only just so.

“If you were one of my apprentices you wouldn’t—“

“Well it’s a good thing I’m not, and never will be.” She bit back quickly. 

_That remains to be seen, _he thought. If he was going to bring her to his side he was going to need to use different tactics. Asking her wasn’t going to work, pleading her hadn’t either. 

How humiliated he was that day when she refused his hand. Upon waking up and finding her gone, the fury had engulfed him; had made him feel invincible and limitless in all of the dark power it granted him. It had also made him reckless and he’d paid a heavy price for that. The resistance rabble had escaped and Luke had—  
  
Kylo clenched his fists until his joints ached and leaned away from Rey, banishing his train of thought to the deepest, darkest part of his mind. 

“You probably don’t even know how to unlock them.” He finally said, bitterness coating his tongue. “I imagine you spend most of your time scrounging around that old ship, fixing things that are no doubt broken and malfunctioning instead of training your powers like you should.”

Kylo saw her hands ball into fists, and then release as she let out a long sigh.

“Well, I _am_ just a dirty scavenger.” She mumbled. “Might as well make myself useful.” 

“Stop saying that.” He growled.

“You said it first.” She replied petulantly. 

Kylo wanted to slash a hole in the wall. He found himself in her face, not letting her hide away from him anymore. “And you’ve twisted my words to give yourself something to be pitied about. Stop it. You are far from pitiful, and we both know it.” 

The fire was back in her eyes, and then just as quickly she shut them, dousing it. _No_, he wanted to scream. _Let it burn_.   
  
“Can we just…_stop fighting_, for one moment? Please?”   
  
The brokenness underlying her voice reminded him that there was a reason she was here; a bad dream that had apparently led to her stealing things and attacking someone. The Dark side was calling to her, just as it had called to him.

Kylo moved away from her, giving her space again. She relaxed after a few minutes of silence, until he spoke up softly.

“Why are you here, Rey?” He looked at her, unable to see her face now that her hair had formed a curtain between them. “Did you hurt someone?” 

She glanced at him briefly, stiffly, but ultimately continued to ignore him until Kylo was sure the connection would end without her answering him at all. 

He wished for that time when she’d confessed her thoughts and feelings so openly with him, the night they first touched hands through the Force. She’d even been open with him the times before this, yelling match or no. Why was she being so secretive now? What had changed? Or, was the nature of the mysterious bad-dream-happening cause for her silence? Was she ashamed?

Kylo could remember those feelings— feelings of shame, fear, and anxiety, stemming from the idea that he was broken somehow, somehow wrong. It had caused him too much grief in that old life—that weak life.

But he was strong now. He didn’t have that conflict within him anymore. How could he help her see she was not alone? That she needn’t feel these conflicted feelings—that there was a path that erased them?

He was loathe to bring up any of his past, the past of the dead man he killed when he burned down Luke’s temple. She made it very difficult for him to forget however, by her insistent use of his old name. And yet, he knew talking about that old life gave him a chance at reaching Rey in a way that allowed him to entice her closer. Soon enough she’d be close enough to have completely; with him and the Dark Side of the Force. 

As he gnawed on the inside of his lip, trying to strategize the best way to talk to her (in a non-antagonistic way), Rey quietly spoke up, breaking the silence herself.   
  
“The dream from the other night….the nightmare about Luke and the temple….do you have it often?”

Kylo glanced at her, almost forgetting his agenda by wanting to tell her it was none of her business how often he dreamt it, then caught himself and shook his head stiffly. “No.” He shifted in his seat, the floor becoming uncomfortable. “That was the first time in a long while.”

“It was because of the Knights, wasn’t it?”

He didn’t say anything, but he didn’t need to. They both knew it was probably the truth.

“Do you have nightmares like that often? Where you remember all the horrible things you’ve done? Where you relive the worst moments of your life?”

There was nothing mocking or accusatory in her tone as she spoke, but Kylo couldn’t help the knee-jerk want to make some biting comment back. Instead he clenched his fists, breathing deeply. He didn’t answer for a moment, his voice quiet but hoarse when he finally did.   
“Yes.”

Finally she turned to look at him. Her eyes were full of deep-seated turmoil, reflected in his own. It surprised him somewhat, and yet he felt an immediate understanding to it. How many times had he looked in the mirror and seen the same thing in his own eyes?

“I do too.” She swallowed, eyes unfocused. “I try so hard to forget, most of the time I can. I’ve become so good at burying things inside myself—like the truth about my parents— because it feels like if I have to think about the truths, if I have to accept the reality of what they mean, the weight of it all will somehow crush me.” She took a deep breath. “Sometimes when I wake up from my nightmares, I feel like something’s on top of me, on my chest, pressing down, and I can’t _breathe_.” Her hands pressed to her chest, the binders digging into her sternum. 

“Even now, I can’t bring myself to confront the things that still haunt me in my sleep. I don’t have the strength for it. I hope you never have to see—“ She stopped, eyes closing painfully, fists clenched on her thighs. Her lips pressed into a thin line and she shook her head. When her eyes finally opened they were bleak.

“It’s not even about my parents anymore.”

“Rey,” Kylo said, his voice softly wry. “There’s nothing you could have done in your life that I can judge you for.”

Rey glanced at him, her expression unconvinced and wary. “You’ve been inside my head but you haven’t seen everything.” At that Kylo remembered the wall in her mind he wasn’t able to penetrate the day he’d interrogated her. He’d seen quite a lot of her life, but whatever it was being kept hidden in that place in her mind, it remained a secret. Something bad enough to give her nightmares, evidently. 

She looked back down at her lap. “I don’t mean this offensively, but I don’t know how you deal with all the horrible things in your life, Ben. I can hardly deal with the things I did just to survive.” 

Kylo knew she’d lived alone on Jakku, he’d felt her intense loneliness the day he’d gone into her mind to find the map. He hadn’t dallied too long on her experiences trying to stay alive on that desert planet, but now he wished he did. She certainly had an aptitude to do anything it took to get the job done, but he had a feeling he was underestimating her limits. Just what had she been forced to do to survive? And how can she think he would ever hold it against her? He’d done far worse things, no doubt. Far, far worse things.

He took a breath. “I let them give me strength.”

“The way killing your father didn’t?”

He clenched his jaw, looking down. There was that sharp tongue again, the one that had called him a murderous snake and a monster. But there lacked the same bite this time, and he could sense that Rey regretted her words instantly.

“I’m sorry.” She murmured, shaking her head. “I shouldn’t’ve—“

“No,” he snapped, then swallowed and his voice was softer. “No, I’m the one who should be sorry. Han Solo….my father—“ his voice broke as he said it, as if the words hadn’t be spoken for such a long time that saying them lifted dust along with the painful memories. This wasn’t something he’d wanted to ever think about again, or even say out loud, but Rey had a way of getting him to open up in ways he’d not been able to since he was a child.

He took a shuddering deep breath. “The sins I have committed will haunt me for the rest of my life, Rey. I’ve accepted that burden. I relish in it most days. But killing him…” He looked down at his hands, forever soaked in the blood of so many.

He turned to look at her. “You asked me why I hated my father, all that time ago. Why I killed him. Do you remember?”

“Yes.” She whispered. 

“I told you that I didn’t hate him, and you couldn’t understand why I still did it.”

“I still don’t.”

He shook his head, frustrated. “You of all people should be able to understand.”

Rey peered at him, her eyes searching him as she tried to remember.

“You accused my parents of throwing me away like garbage.” She said, her voice tense. “Do you feel like your parents threw you away too?”

“I don’t _feel_ it, I know it.” He seethed. 

“Leia loves you.” Rey protested hotly. “Han did too—“ 

“Yeah?” He fumed. “Was it love that made my father leave us when it looked like I wasn’t going to be normal like him? He took off in that fucking ship, again and again, staying long enough to get his fill of us, and then as soon as the going got tough, he got going.”

“That’s not—“

“You knew him for two days.” Kylo hissed, teeth bared. “I’ve known him my whole life, and I’ll tell you again what I told you before: he would have disappointed you. He would have taken one look at you now and taken off on the _Falcon_ with the first excuse he could find. He probably would have put you in here himself.”

“You’re wrong.” She said, her voice wavering, uncertain now in the face of the truth of his words.

Kylo scoffed. “You’re so naive, Rey. Not every legend you meet is a hero. Sometimes the handsome rogue is actually hiding a disfigured and hideous soul beneath the charming veneer.”

She glared at him. “Well, if that’s true then it looks like the apple hasn’t fallen far from the tree.” But just as quickly as it came the heat in her expression died as her words sank in. Kylo was about to bite something back but found himself just staring at her. 

Kylo knew he had a handsomeness about him; he was told countless times growing up that he’d inherited his parents’ good looks. But for some reason this accidental confession meant more to him than any of those times, even if it came on the back of an insult.

Rey’s face reddened and she turned away with a grumbled, “Just go away. I’m done being called names for today, so if you’ve nothing nice to say, just leave.” 

“I’m surprised the connection has—“ The quiet ended, Rey disappeared, and Kylo was left alone on the floor of his room. “—lasted this long.” 

Kylo sighed, eyes closed, trying to hold onto the warmth her presence brought him.

He could see what was happening to her. He knew it with enough certainty that he would have bet the entire wealth of the First Order on it. He knew it deeply, empathetically, because he had gone through almost the exact same thing.

They were afraid of her. Afraid of her powers, afraid of the darkness they could feel from her, the darkness they were helping to grow by pushing her away and isolating her so. And she was feeling that isolation. Her confused emotions were making her even more volatile, even more susceptible to the influence of the Dark Side. 

More susceptible to him. 

A part of him was glad that the rosy view she’d had of the Resistance was finally turning into the grungy shade of reality, but he also felt a sort of remorse. He would not want what he went through to ever happen to her—to be cast out and betrayed by those she needed the most. 

But then again, the more they showed their true colors, the more likely he could persuade her to join him in destroying them. Together at last, the dark side flowing through them unimpeded by the light, burgeoning on their shared hatred, their shared passion…

Yes, this was a tragic thing that was happening to her, but in the end the pain and despair would help forge their inevitable union. All he had to do was wait. 


End file.
